Estimate of longer term trend of age at marriage is available from the marital status question in the decennial censuses. The proportion of single women in each age group can be arrived from the answers to questions about marital status. Of all possible answers to this question such as married, divorced, remarried, the never married , i.e. single status is the least confusing. For those who eventually marry, the average age at marriage would equal to the average years for which they remained single. Hence the proportion single is used to compute the singulate mean age at marriage of females (SMAM-F). This is indirect estimate of mean age at marriage, can be obtained from any cross sectional survey, asking about the marital status of women in various age groups. The prefix "singulate" refers to the computational method of arriving at the mean age at marriage. The main difference between the direct and indirect estimate is about the time location of the estimates. The directly estimated average age at marriage clearly refers to the period for which marriage registration data is available. The time location of singulate mean age marriage is imprecise. This estimate refers to a much longer time period. Thus SMAM-F estimate can be a valid tool to assess medium and long term trends in age at marriage.

Figure 1 shows mean age at marriage estimated from the 1961, 71, 81 and 91 censuses. The average age at marriage has been gradually increasing over the last five decades. The increase in average age at marriage of girls is very gradual in the country taken as a whole, increasing from about 16 years for people enumerated in 1961 to about 19 years for those enumerated in 1991. The rate of increase in age at marriage for Andhra Pradesh and its neighboring states is similar to the national trend. The average age at marriage in AP was comparatively much lower for people enumerated in 1961. The same situation continued over the four decades. As a result Andhra Pradesh maintained its dubious distinction of very high proportion of child marriages compared to the country as a whole as well as situation in the neighboring states. A recent study by Satya Sekhar (2000) in Nizamabad district estimated the mean age at marriage at 17.8 years. This is consistent with all AP average of 18.3 years observed form 1991 census.

Figure 2 shows more recent estimate of the marital status of girls younger than 18 years for AP, neighboring states and India. The high incidence of early marriages in AP compared to all its neighboring states as well as the Indian average is very clearly seen here. About 41% of young girls in AP marry below the legal age at marriage, which is 18 years. The Indian average is 19% i.e, less than half of the estimate for AP. In Kerala and Tamil Nadu only about 5% of young girls below 18 years are married. The figure is slightly higher for other neighboring states like Karnataka (17%), Maharashtra (20%), Madhya Pradesh (29%), and Orissa (13%).

High prevalence of child marriage in Andhra Pradesh is also confirmed by recent estimate from the National Family Health Surveys conducted in 1998-99 (NFHS-2). Table-1 shows that about 64% of women respondents aged 20-24 years had married before they were 18 years old. This group of respondents is very young, i.e, 20-24 years in 1998-99. Thus the 64% among them who married before they were 18 would have done so before 1996. Hence this estimate would relate to the early 1990s. Multiple Indicator Sample Survey (MICS-2000) estimated that in AP the mean age at marriage is 15.3 (14.7yrs in rural and 16.7yrs in urban areas). Median age at marriage i.e, the age by which 50 percent women got married is close to 15 years. This is far below the legal age at marriage of 18 years set by the Govt. of India. Another survey (Sekhar,2000) in Nizamabad district found that 44% of married women married before 18 years of age.

The mean age at marriage derived from cross sectional surveys like the census and NFHS are indirect estimates. Ideally, estimates of average age at marriage of females, prevalent around any given time period is computed by ascertaining the age of the brides for all marriages taking place during that period. Since most marriages are not registered in India, such direct estimation of average age at marriage was not feasible. Starting with 1990, the Sample Registration System (SRS) has been collecting information on the number of females who got effectively married during the reference period of six months of each half yearly survey (SRS, 1991-1998). Thus direct estimates of average age at marriage is now available for India and major states from 1991 onwards. Figure-3 shows direct estimates of the average female age at marriage for India, Andhra Pradesh, and its neighboring states. Clearly, female age at marriage is lowest in AP compared to India as well as the neighboring states. What is worrying is the recent trend showing a further reduction in the average age at marriage. Since the SRS sample size is small, we can not attach much importance to the declining trend suggested by the estimates for recent years. However, the overall estimate spread across the decade of 1990s showing very low age at marriage for girls in AP can not be wished away.

Marriage is a very personal and important decision made by families. Many factors would naturally contribute to the age at marriage. Average age at marriage for girls in urban areas has been found to be higher by about 1-3 years compared to the rural areas (Ahuja, 1993). Data from NFHS-2 show that a larger proportion of young girls living in rural areas get married below 18 years of age (Table 2).

Table 2 also confirms the earlier observation that the average age at marriage has been gradually increasing. For example, the women in the 45-49 year age group would have experienced the marriage customs prevalent about 20-30 years ago. The women now aged 15-19, and 20-24 years are experiencing contemporary nuptial customs.

Source: NFHS-2(AP) and MICS-2000 (AP)

We see from Table 2, that the proportion of women in older age groups who had their marriage when they were less than 18 years is much higher compared to women in younger age groups. This proportion gradually falls as we approach the girls in younger age group. The rural-urban difference is also very clearly recognised. About 73% of 20-24 year women in rural areas said that they were married before their 18th birthday, compared to 43% in case of urban areas. The right two columns show that the mean age at marriage has gradually increased over time. The rural - urban difference of about two years in average age at marriage of girls has been sustained and may have increased a little over the last 30 years.

Various factors associated with residence in rural or urban areas may actually be working to cause the rural-urban gap in average age at marriage. For example, educational status of women appears to influence the age at marriage. Incidence of child marriage is considerably lower among educated women. Educated girls are more likely to marry after attaining the legal age at marriage. Infact within each group, the median age at first marriage is about five to six years later among women who have completed high school than among illiterate women.

Updated by Samatha Reddy Dated: 18/08/2003