New mobile app to tackle forced marriage in UK

A new government-funded smartphone app has been launched in Britain to protect potential victims at risk of being forced into marriage, including those of Indian-origin.

The 'Freedom' app has been designed with inputs from Scotland Yard to coincide with new figures released by the Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) that indicate that youngsters between the age group of 16 and 25 fall in the high-risk category.

"In accessing the Freedom app, the user is just two clicks away from getting life-saving help. It is a fact that girls and boys of Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi-origin are most at risk of being forced into marriages, when often all they want is to be able to complete their education," said Aneeta Prem, founder of the Freedom Charity, which has created the free-to-download app on www.freedom.org.uk.

"Hence it is all the more important to create worldwide awareness on the issue and we will also be travelling to India in the next few weeks," Prem said.

According to the 2012 statistics released by the FMU here, the maximum number of calls for help came from victims of Pakistani origin (47.1 per cent), followed by Bangladeshi (11 per cent) and Indian (8 per cent).

"We are not against arranged marriage, which is very different from forced marriages that are often linked to domestic violence. These youngsters are often brought up in two contrasting cultures, which creates the problem," Prem added.

A two-year-old girl was among at least 250 children in the UK helped last year by the FMU, which is a joint initiative between the Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO).

The 1,485 cases handled by the unit largely centred around London (21 per cent), followed by the West Midlands (16 per cent) but it is feared there are far more cases that go unreported.

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