Stuti Agarwal Writes: Today in the name of culture and religion is India again facing the problem of narrow-mindedness or is it setting yet another example of its misogyny?. In the age where the entire world is moving forward, discoveries are being made every day, countries are trying to one up each other; Indian Muslim women are still fighting for their basic marital freedom. They are fighting against issues like polygamy and divorce.
In Sharia (Islamic law) the concept of Triple Talaq (Divorce) allows men to end their weddings by just saying “talaq” Thrice. Women are not entitled to any prior notice by the husband. The divorce can take place anywhere at any point of time. The main origin of these problems is not religion itself but the misinterpretation of the same. For example the utterance of the word Talaq in Sharia is supposed to be spread over a period of 90 days and not at once. The fight is not against the law of the religion but against its misuse.
The case against the instantaneous Triple Talaq first came to light in 2015 when a woman named Shayara Bano a resident of Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh filed the litigation in the Supreme Court against her husband who divorced her by means of a letter (Talaq- Nama) and also took the children in his custody denying her any access to them whatsoever. He justified himself by saying that he had given her talaq the way Shariat and Hadith allowed him to and with regard to that he cannot take her back because it would be considered against the Shariat law, which would be a disrespect to his religion.
Today many more such cases are coming up. In Uttar Pradesh, Muslim women from all walks of life are coming together to file a petition to the Uttar Pradesh Government. The women have approached the Uttar Pradesh Minister for Women and Family welfare, Rita Bahuguna Joshi. Women have shown their support for Bhartiya Janata Party who stand in the support of the abolition of such a law which prohibits women of their basic right of life, liberty and equality. A woman named Aliya Siddiqui, based in Kanpur after marrying a government official found out that her husband was married to another woman, on protesting she was thrown out of the house and then two months later she was divorced by a letter which she received from a speed post. A 22 year old woman named Shabreen was divorced by her husband on a simple phone call. These are just few of many victims of such wrong doings by the hands of chauvinistic men.
The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath as well as Indian Prime Minister Mr Narendra Modi support the cause and stand against the Triple Talaq divorce system in Islam. There are still a number of orthodox Indians in our society according to whom everything that is taking place is absolutely baseless. They say that the Government should not be concerned with such petty issues as there are plenty more problems that need immediate gratification like poverty, education and many more.
It is only appropriate for me to bring to notice that 59% Indian women get divorced every year because of triple talaq without any support and end up ruining their lives because of the misdeeds committed by others. I would like to conclude by saying that for a tree to grow one has to tend to the roots of the sapling. Women are the roots of any civilization, they are the source of life itself and till the point the male patriarchy of Indian society ends and learns to live with women with equal rights no country, no civilization can achieve what it aspires to.