The Embassy of India in Muscat has taken up the issue of a 16-year-old girl from Hyderabad being sold off and married to a Omani sheikh, identifed as Ahmed.
The Times of India reported that the Embassy shot off a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Sultanate of Oman, citing her primary school records to show that she was born on August 18, 2002.
"This means, she was under 16 years at the time of her marriage in June 2017. Prima facie, it appears that Ahmed has violated both Indian and Omani laws, which require 18 years as the minimum age of marriage," TOI quoted the the embassy's letter as saying.
The marriage was performed in May at a guest house in Jalpally where the Omani national was staying. He returned home after the marriage and sent a visa for the girl, who later joined him in Muscat.
Later, the girl informed her parents over the phone that her husband was mentally and physically torturing her.
Following this, her mother Fathima* lodged a complaint at the Falaknuma police station that her husband, his sister, Ghousia Begum, and brother-in-law, Sikander, "sold" the girl to the Omani man for Rs 5 lakh.
According to reports, they paid Rs 5 lakh to the brokers at the time of 'nikaah', which they also allegedly split with the Qazi who performed the marriage.
"The police contacted Ahmed through the Indian Embassy in Oman and asked him to send the teenager back. The man said that he will send the girl soon. But now he is demanding the Rs 5 lakh he had paid to the brokers and the family here at the time of marriage. Embassy officials are also making efforts to convince him and is seeking help from the Oman government too," DCP, south,V Satyanarayana had earlier told Deccan Chronicle.