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The Constitution of India guards interreligious love and marriage, protects private liberties and offers authorized preparations for a similar, consultants say. Against this backdrop of constitutional safeguards, varied state governments like Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have determined to border legal guidelines in opposition to the so-called observe of ‘love jihad’ with Madhya Pradesh proposing a provision for 5 years’ jail time period for ‘violators’.
Constitutional consultants Information18.com spoke to identified that with ‘love jihad’ being a conspiracy concept, having no proof, the strikes by the states are in opposition to the spirit of the supreme regulation of the land – the Constitution – which guards one’s liberty to decide on a accomplice from any religion and caste.
At the time a Tanishq advert was pulled down a few month in the past after there was a social media outcry over it for allegedly encouraging ‘love jihad’, Faizan Mustafa, vice-chancellor of the National Academy of Legal Studies and Research (NALSAR) uploaded a video explaining how the uproar over ‘love jihad’ will not be in consonance with the values of the Constitution.
“Marrying any person is only a non-public resolution, and the state has no concern with this. The entire subject is about Article 21 of the Indian Constitution that provides ‘protection of life and personal liberty’. No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law,” said Mustafa. He added that in India, the Constitution gives the freedom of making a choice, “and under that every girl and boy has the right to choose his or her partner”.
He said that since the Constitution encourages love and marriage across faiths and beliefs, the Special Marriage Act, 1954 was framed. “What is the Special Marriage Act? We call it court marriages, but it is a constitutional arrangement to ensure people exercise personal liberty in choosing a partner.”
The Special Marriage Act, 1954, is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted to provide a special form of marriage for the people of India and all Indian nationals in foreign countries, irrespective of the religion or faith followed by either party. “These marriages are valid,” he said.
Mustafa made a point that in many other countries the freedom to marry is advancing where “marriage between two men and two women is valid, while here we are curbing the agency of adults and women”.
It’s appalling, he mentioned, that the “same people want Uniform Civil Code”.
“My argument is that law encourages interreligious marriages. If you want Uniform Civil Code, then we must encourage such kinds of marriages. What is UCC? It is a Special Marriage Act and Indian Succession Act. Under the UCC a person of one religion will be marrying a person of another religion. It is quite appalling that on the one hand, the BJP is advocating for UCC and on the other hand it is raising the bogey of love jihad in some states,” he mentioned. “Love jihad is a political stunt with appeal to a particular constituency.”
Constitutionalist Subhash C Kashyap finds no logic and purpose behind formulating an anti ‘love jihad’ regulation. He mentioned the purpose that must be highlighted is of the seventhSchedule of the Constitution. “If state’s steps contradict the union law, it will not hold before the course of law,” Kashyap mentioned.
The seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India defines and specifies allocation of powers and features between the union and states. It comprises three lists: the union listing, the state listing and the concurrent listing.
Kashyap echoed Mustafa’s views that there are constitutional provisions to make sure marriage and punish coercion. “There are provisions in the Constitution to check forcible conversions or coercion of any kind. Will is not barred by law. But if there is force in marriage or conversion then it is already a crime; we have provisions to check these incidents in any case,” he mentioned and added that there are authorized advisors who will need to have knowledgeable the state governments in regards to the weaknesses in legislating on ‘love jihad. But the BJP-ruled states are nonetheless doing it as a result of “love jihad is a political tool. They know about its baselessness but want to make a political point out of it,” he mentioned.
The worry of Muslim males marrying or courting Hindu ladies is sort of 100 years outdated. Mustafa mentioned many incidents on the difficulty of ‘love jihad’ date again to the 1920s and had been used as a ploy to demonise Muslim males on the one hand and curb the company of Hindu ladies on the opposite.
Past incidents when such preventive measures had been taken to cease Hindu ladies from assembly Muslim males are a lot, mentioned Mustafa, narrating that in 1925 the Hindu Mahasabha, Banaras, established a volunteer squad to stop Hindu ladies from marrying Muslim males. There had been notices put up in public locations of Allahabad and Jaunpur for preserving tabs on Hindu ladies. This was all to limit their selections. In 1928, the Pratap newspaper carried an article with deal with Faizabad the place Hindu ladies had been allegedly being seduced by Muslim males.
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