“I want to be able to stand on my own two feet,” 21‑year‑old Khushbu said, her voice calm but full of quiet determination. The smile on her face isn’t just relief—it’s the glow of someone who has finally reclaimed her childhood. Just a few days ago, a court annulled the marriage that was forced on her in 2016, when she was only 12, in her hometown of Jodhpur, reported Indian Express.
Talking about her child marriage, Khushbu said that back then, she didn’t fully understand what was happening. “People in the community married me off when I was young,” she recalls. “Back then, my parents’ opinions didn’t really matter. I was still going to school and didn’t understand much. I didn’t even realise I was getting married—mera shaadi ho rahi thi, mujhe toh kuch samajh hi nahi aa raha tha us time,” she told the media outlet, still baffled by the memory. “It was only when I got older that I realised I had already been married off.”
That realisation slowly turned into a refusal to accept it as her destiny. A few years ago, the pressure from her in‑laws grew stronger—there was a clear expectation that she would soon move in with her husband, the gauna ritual that, in many child marriages, marks the start of a married life the girl never agreed to live. That’s when something inside her shifted. “I told my family that I didn’t want to continue this child marriage,” she said.
Pushing back meant reaching out for help. Khushbu went to the local women’s police station, the mahila thana, where she first heard about Dr Kriti Bharti. “Didi,” as she calls her, became the doorway to her freedom. With Bharti’s support, Khushbu’s case reached the Family Court. In Jodhpur, Judge Varun Talwar, presiding over Family Court Number 2, recently annulled the marriage, calling child marriage a crime that ruins both the present and future of children. The court held that the marriage violated Section 3 of the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, which clearly states that a child marriage is voidable at the option of the person who was a child at the time.
This came after about 18 long, emotionally heavy months of Khushbu fighting for the annulment, insisting that her marriage had taken place under social pressure, with no real consent from her as a 12‑year‑old.
Khushbu is quick to credit Bharti, the managing trustee of Saarthi Trust and a rehabilitation psychologist, for being the pillar behind her legal battle. “She filed my case, guided me, stood by me,” Khushbu says simply. “Didi ne meri zindagi ki sabse badi khushi di hai—maine apni khudki zindagi ko wapas pa liya,” she adds. “She has given me the biggest happiness of my life.”
For Bharti, Khushbu’s story is not just an isolated success. “This is not just her victory,” she says, “but a message for society. Every girl has the right to say no, the right to say, ‘I’m not ready for this.’ Our responsibility is not only to stop child marriages, but to rebuild the lives that were stolen.”
Now, Khushbu’s focus is on rebuilding her life, not on the trauma of the past. She dropped out of school after Class 7, a casualty of the way her life was snatched from her too early. “I want to do something good in life,” she says. “I don’t want to be dependent on anyone.” For now, that means going back to education. She is preparing to write her Class 10 exams and finish her studies. “I have to fulfill Didi’s promise,” she says, repeating it like a quiet vow.
Education, Bharti explains, is the real “fee” at Saarthi Trust. “We don’t charge them monetarily here,” she says. “They pay us back by studying, by becoming stronger, by becoming independent. Getting an education is more important than anything else.” It’s a philosophy that turns empowerment into a daily practice rather than a distant dream.
Why Khushbu was married off at a young age?
Khushbu’s story also opens a window into the deeply rooted social customs that continue to fuel child marriage in parts of Rajasthan. Bharti describes a practice called mausar or nukta pratha—a tradition where, if a maternal or paternal grandparent passes away, grandchildren are married off together during a post‑death meal ceremony. “Mausar ke naam par, jab koi dada‑dadi ya daadi‑nana jaati hain, toh unke sabhi poton‑potiyo ki shaadi kara di jaati hai, uske saath mrityubhoj hota hai,” Bharti explains. “They say the soul of the dead person will find peace if all the grandchildren are married.” Under this pressure, there is no real checking of the boy’s or girl’s background, no genuine consent, and no space for dissent.
In many cases, families who refuse to comply face social exile. “Agar koi parivaar kehne mein nahi aata, toh unhe casta aur samaj se alag karne ka daayan hota hai,” Bharti says. “So they give in, often out of fear, not choice.”
For over a decade, Bharti has been quietly fighting against this system, helping annul 54 child marriages and preventing more than 2,200 minors from being married off. Each case carries its own weight, but every win—like Khushbu’s—sends a ripple through the community. “The task is far from over,” she says, “but each girl who says no, and each courtroom that stands with her, chips away at the myth that this is just ‘tradition’.”
Khushbu’s journey is not only about her own freedom; it’s also a mirror to the rest of her family. Her younger siblings, a brother and a sister, were also married as children, with her sister being married on the same day. When asked about them, Khushbu chooses patience over panic. “Once they grow up, they will decide what they want,” she says. “I can’t take that choice away from them. But I can show them that it’s possible to say no—and that you can still live, and even thrive, on your own terms.”
Today, when Khushbu talks about wanting to “stand on her own two feet,” it’s not just a metaphor. It’s a promise she’s making to herself, and to every girl who still hasn’t found the courage—or the support—to walk away from a childhood stolen by someone else’s idea of tradition.