New Delhi: Madhya Pradesh Interior Minister Narottam Mishra has said that a “love jihad bill”, which includes five years of rigorous imprisonment for “violators”, will soon be introduced to the state assembly.
Until now, “love jihad” was not a term recognized by any legal system in India. It was coined by the Sangh parivar ensembles to describe an imaginary Muslim conspiracy to convert unsuspecting Hindu women to Islam.
The charge will be recognizable and cannot be bailed, Mishra told reporters, according to a report in the Indian express. The bill will also have a provision that will make it necessary to notify the district collector one month in advance before entering into an interfaith marriage.
“There will be a provision to declare null and void marriages that take place by force, by fraud or by tempting someone, for religious conversion. Those who help to commit this crime will also be considered part of the crime, ”said Mishra.
The BJP government led by Shivraj Singh Chouhan has previously indicated that it would enact legislation against “love jihad.” “Jihad in the name of love will not be allowed at any cost in the state. The necessary legal provisions will be made against love jihad, ”the prime minister had said.
The BJP-led governments in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh are also reportedly considering legal provisions against “love jihad” despite the fact that the right to marry a person of their choice is guaranteed by article 21 of the constitution.
At a recent BJP election rally in Jaunpur, UP Prime Minister Yogi Adityanath, referring to a comment from the Allahabad high court that conversion “only for the purpose of marriage” was unacceptable, said his government was working to implement a strict law to curb incidents of “love jihad”.
However, Judge (retired) Aditya Nath Mittal, Chairman of the Uttar Pradesh State Law Commission, had said the Hindu that if the state government sought to introduce ‘limited scope legislation’ restricting marriages between a Hindu and a Muslim under the guise of curbing ‘love jihad’, it would not be kept in law.
The term also recently accumulated after a 21-year-old student was shot and killed outside his university in Ballabgarh, Haryana, last month. The victim’s family has alleged that the defendant had been pressuring her to convert and marry him.
The founder of Patanjali, Ramdev, also called the murder a case of “love jihad” and said that “only the public hanging of the accused can prevent the recurrence of such crimes.”
Karnataka Prime Minister BS Yediyurappa has also said that his government will take steps to end religious conversions in the name of “love jihad.”
“Young women from the state are being attracted in the name of love and money and converting to other religions, we have seriously considered it,” Yediyurappa told an executive meeting of the Bharatiya Janata party. “After a thorough review, we will take a strong action.”
Last month, the president of the National Commission, Rekha Sharma, tweeted that she had discussed the “increase in cases of love jihad” with the Governor of Maharashtra, Bhagat Singh Koshyari. However, a query under the Right to Information Act revealed that the NCW did not keep any data on “love jihad” cases.
Earlier this year, the Union Minister of State for the Home G. Kishan Reddy said that the term “love jihad” was not defined in current laws and that none of the central agencies had reported any cases of “love jihad. jihad”. Reddy also said that article 25 of the constitution establishes the freedom to profess, practice and propagate religion subject to public order, morals and health.
However, the minister said that the National Investigative Agency (NIA) had investigated two cases from Kerala related to inter-religious marriage. One on whether Hadiya, a Kerala woman, was forcibly converted by her husband before marriage. Despite Hadiya’s repeated insistence that she had married of her own free will, the Kerala High Court had annulled her marriage, only for the High Court to eventually reinstate it.
Writing for The wire, NC Asthana had noted, “The specter of ‘love jihad’ communalizes and criminalizes a matter of personal choice between two consenting adults. Such laws, if passed, in addition to being ultra vires of the constitution, it will also demonstrate how the legislative process could be deliberately abused to advance a political agenda. It would be inherently immoral because it would seek to delegitimize something as sacred as love. It would be patriarchal and anti-women because it would treat Hindu women as the ‘property’ of their men and thus control their sexuality. It would be degrading to them because it would presume that they are so gullible that they cannot be trusted to decide what is good for them in life. “
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