UNISON women heard a moving and inspirational speech this morning from Jasvinder Sanghera of the organisation Karma Nirvana, which campaigns on forced marriage and ‘honour’ crimes.
Born in Britain, she told women’s conference delegates in Brighton how her sisters were taken out of school to be married to men they’d never met, and nobody questioned what was happening.
When she herself was 14 years old, her mother sat her down and showed her a photograph of a man to whom she had apparently been pledged to when she was just eight. She eventually ran away to avoid the marriage, but has been disowned by her family since.
“In my life the perpetrators were not men, they were my mother and my sisters,” she said.
For many women, she added, “the place they are meant to be the safest is the place of pain.
Ms Sanghera stressed the importance of education in tackling ‘honour’ crimes and forced marriage, and criticised the fear of tackling such issues because of “cultural sensitivity”.
She urged delegates to ask their local authorities what they are doing to tackle forced marriage and ‘honor’ crime.
