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Must respect interfaith couple, not pry into their privacy: SC

The Supreme Court said on Monday it will always respect the decision of an adult couple to live together, rather than scrutinize a marriage just because the couple belongs to different religions.

‘As a system and as an institution, we must respect the decision of a couple,’ noted a bench of justices Uday U Lalit and Ajay Rastogi while refusing to hear a plea by a woman’s parents, who claimed that their Hindu daughter was forcefully converted to Islam and married to a Muslim man against her will.

The parents filed a habeas corpus petition alleging that the man had unjustly detained the lady and that an inquiry into the circumstances of their purported marriage following forced conversion was required. But the court remarked: ‘As a system, we should not be prying into the privacy of a couple if a man and woman want to live together. We have to respect their decision as adults.’

The court based its decision on the woman’s account to police officials in Chandigarh, where the pair resided together.

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The decision comes as some governments enact laws that make interfaith weddings more difficult. The Gujarat High Court recently blocked several sections of new state legislation on this issue and the threat of love-jihad. Several right-wing organisations think there is a conspiracy in which Muslim males conceal their beliefs and woo, marry and convert women of other religions, primarily Hinduism.

The woman’s declaration, which was appended to the counter-affidavit submitted by lawyer Shantanu Sagar for the Union territory of Chandigarh, stated that she is living with the man of her own free choice and there is no compulsion. The woman also stated that her parents were opposed to the relationship, but she married the man in January and now lives happily with him.

The affidavit also included the couple’s marriage certificate, which was filed in Jammu and Kashmir, the man’s native state, as well as their birth certificates, which showed the woman to be 25 and the man to be 28 years old.

‘Look at her statement. She has reported to the police that she is married of her own will. Look at the way the letter has been written. The letters are all straight and there are no cuts. The letter shows its author is not under any kind of stress or coercion,’ the bench said.

It asked the parents’ lawyer whether they had any objections to her handwriting on the police statement. ‘Since you are not doubting the handwriting, we cannot be of any assistance to you. A person, who is forced to make a statement, will not write like this. This is a clear case of a man or a woman being in complete sense and in control, while writing a letter,’ the bench told the parents’ counsel, Sudarsh Menon.

After Menon stated that he could not contest the handwriting, the court stated that this is not a matter where the court should intervene and that the couple’s decision should be honoured. The petition was then withdrawn by the attorney.

Another bench of the Supreme Court emphasised the freedom of adults to select their life partners in February, saying that it is past time the society accepts inter caste or interfaith marriages without harassing the couples .

That bench, led by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul, observed that while ‘educated young boys and girls are increasingly choosing their life partner on their own,’ which may be viewed as a deviation by society and parents, police authorities were required to keep such couples out of harm’s way if there was no violation of the law. The panel was considering an intercaste marriage case from Karnataka at the time. The couple went to the Supreme Court for help with a criminal prosecution brought by the woman’s father.

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