@dreamy17 Arranged marriage still alive and well in many countries such as Japan, India, Indonesia, Arab Saudi, UAE, Thailand, Malaysia etc. Please note this is uncommon and only a small part of population who still did it.
Mostly it works only if the arranged individuals consent to it, if not then parents cannot do anything to force it. This is the common practice.
There are rare exceptions however, in some area with poor economy and bad education arranged marriage have the same meaning with "selling brides". Meaning the girls cannot reject the marriage and will be forced to marry regardless of their will. Usually this results in
child marriage. Please note this practice is illegal. Forging documents will do the job.
Why the parents married their children forcefully? Because the economic benefits. Usually rich man will marry daughter of poor family, usually underage, then the man will took responsibility just like any normal husband. The girl's family will reduce the mouth to feed while getting some money from the husband.
It's uncommon but really happen, at least in underdeveloped area in my country Indonesia, the man will later divorced the woman just because he can and will search another girl to marry with. What about the girl from poor family? She will have to took responsibility of her children alone or come back to her parents home with additional mouths to feed. Stupid? It is. The government has intervened since years ago with limited result.
No, religion isn't the cause. There are many research about this topic and the factors behind this phenomenon are economy (90%) and culture (10%). This is the same reason why child marriage in medieval age was common, be it in Europe or in Asia at the time. Economy, high mortality rate etc.