Page 113 - Health, Population and Environment Education 9

c. Marriage by running away (Chori bibaha)
The marriage in which a boy and girl run away and get married secretly with mutual
understanding without informing their parents is called chori bibaha. It is common in
every community.

d. Widow marriage (Bidhuwa bibaha)

The marriage in which a widow gets re-married is called widow marriage. It is a social
taboo. According to social tradition, a widow cannot marry again no matter how old is
she.

e. Levirate marriage (Bhauju behorne bibaha)
The marriage in which younger brother gets married with his sister-in-law after the death
of his elder brother is called as levirate marriage. It is common among some ethnic groups.

f. Marriage by performance (Gandharva bibaha)
The marriage in which people get married by
showing special skills and talent is called a marriage
by performance. In Ramayan, Lord Ram got married
to Goddess Sita by showing his strength of lifting
bow in a competition. In Mahabhgarat, Arjun got
married with Draupadi due to his special skill on
archery. It is common among some ethnic groups in
Nepal.

Fig: 42
g. Adultery marriage (Jari bibaha)
The marriage in which a person has to pay some amount of fine for running away with
somebody’s legal wife is called adultery marriage (Jari bibaha). It is not practiced now.
Previously, it was common in the mid western and far western part of Nepal.

Age of marriage
Marriage is an important stage of life. Marriage is compulsory in our society. But people
need to get married at the appropriate age from legal and reproductive point of view. It
is better to get married at the age of (25–30) years for both boy and girl from physical,
mental, psychological, social, economic, educational and reproductive point of view. It
is suggested to have age difference of (4-5) years between husband and wife. Actually, a
female gets mature faster biologically and psychologically than that of a male of the same
age.
According to the law of Nepal, both boy and girl can get married at the age of 18 years
with the consent of parents. But both of them should reach 20 years to get married without
consent of parents. People should not have early marriage and late marriage. Early
marriage makes the health of female weak. There is high risk of termination, complication
during pregnancy and delivery time, increase of fertility period as well as life threat on
mother and child. Similarly, females bearing children after 35 years are prone to various
GREEN Environment Population and Health Education Book-9 113