Shia Board welcomes NDA government's decision on Bill to end triple talaq

New Delhi: The BJP-led NDA government is planning to bring in a legislation in the Winter Session of Parliament to put an end to instant triple talaq or talaq-e-biddat, the Muslim way of divorce, still in practice despite the Supreme Court striking it down on August 23.

Some BJP leaders likened Prime Minister Narendra Modi to social reformer after Raja Rammohan Roy, for taking up the issue for the benefit of Muslim women. The apex court’s judgment was seen as a political victory for the Modi government. With the next Lok Sabha elections less than two years away and crucial Assembly elections lined up next year in Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, the bill could see the government getting accused by the Opposition of trying to gain political mileage

As the law stands today, a victim of talaq-e-biddat has no option but to approach the police for redressal of her grievance, as a Muslim clergy is of no assistance to her.

The All India Shia Personal Law Board welcomed the NDA government's decision to set up the ministerial committee to consider a legislation to end triple talaq.

Activists who spearheaded the movement against 'triple talaq' maintain that they want nothing less than a Muslim personal codified law, and that merely amending the IPC was not enough.

Noorjehan Safia Niaz, co-founder, Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan, said, “We have been demanding a codified law, a legislative protection. Such a law will take care of polygamy, minimum age for marriage etc. Our demand is not to get into IPC, but a new legislation which is comprehensive and is as per the Quran as well as the Constitution.”