Muslim Women in India Ask Top Court to Ban Instant Divorce

1. Soon after India become an independent nation in 1947, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru sought to create a single civil code for the entire country. Although it had one criminal code, created by the British in 1860, there was no civil code that applied to all citizens in all of the previously British provinces or the hundreds of tiny and large states ruled by Nawabs, Princes and Maharajas. There was considerable opposition to this, especially to clauses that would have allowed women an equal share in ancestral property. It took almost a decade to see this though parliament and into law because of how much opposition this had. Its worth remembering that as the party that won India its Independence, Nehru had more support in Parliament than any government since, except one. At some point though, Nehru decided to exclude Muslims from the ambit of the Code, simply because it would have likely sunk the bill. All the leaders who had any pull with the Muslim community had left to Pakistan and there was simply no one who could convince the remaining Muslims that ditching Sharia for the new Code would be beneficial. So the Hindu code bills[1] were passed. (Incidentally, it applied to Jains, Sikhs and Buddhists as well)

2. In 1978 a woman named Shah Bano Begum [2] was divorced by her husband and left destitute. She sued for alimony and was granted it by the local courts. Her ex-husband appealed to the Supreme Court, which rejected his appeal. The Prime Minister at that time, Rajiv Gandhi then passed a law ironically called The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986, that nullified the Supreme Court's judgment in the Shah Bano judgment. He did so for he feared that he would lose votes in the next election if he didn't.

And that is the reason that Muslim women in India get such a raw deal. However, the party in power at the centre and in most states is the BJP, a party that does not seek any Muslim votes to win elections. They have also been promising a Civil Code that will apply to all citizens for about 2 decades now. Some time next year, they will have the numbers in both Houses of Parliament to make that a reality.

The main sticking point that will be difficult to reconcile is that Muslim men are allowed to marry multiple times while the current Hindu Civil Code doesn't allow that. If a Uniform Code is enacted, the status of these existing marriages would be in question.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_code_bills

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohd._Ahmed_Khan_v._Shah_Bano_...

Secondly, a man can end a marriage without any consequences in Sunni islam, instantly. No alimony, not even care for the kids if he doesn't want to. He can just kick the woman out from one day to another.

The woman described in the article experienced both sides of this. She was not allowed a divorce when she wanted one, even when it was obvious her husband was beating her (apparently because she had a daughter instead of a son), and she got no financial support from the man, and neither did her child. She had to shoulder the entire financial burden.

In most muslim nations there are activists demanding changes to the islamic marriage rules. Sometimes along the lines here, but also along other lines, that ending a marriage by the woman becomes possible to end situations of abuse.

There's history behind this. There was a campaign a while back by muslim women to ask that Christian rules be allowed to regulate muslim marriage, because firstly they're not discriminatory towards women, and secondly they demand people take some responsibility for their family.

So you may want to rethink your comment. This is a struggle for equality first.

And of course, there is profound unfairness in islamic marriage. Women, especially when confronted with alternatives, want better. This is not wrong. This is progress.

Islam's rules are discriminatory on many fronts, to the point that there are clear differences in legal status amongst many enforced classes in society, which are not equal before the law. That is one reason islam and sharia are such disasters. The classes in islam are: muslims, non-muslim oppressed Christians and Jews, slaves, and kuffar. Slaves and kuffar can be murdered without punishment (slaves only by their owner). All of these classes are further split between men and women, with the men on top. "Somehow" things like this never seem to come up in discussions of what is and isn't tolerant.