
India's top court rules against instant divorce - abhi3
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-41008802
======
anilgulecha
Bullet points:

\- Indian constitution directly does not have any instant divorce.

\- The Indian constitution provides for freedom of religion, and freedom of
practice of religious traditions.

\- The Muslim personal law board's interpretation was the traditional practice
of divorce is inherent to Islam, and thus, via freedom of religion, something
that muslim men could do with constitutional guarantee.

\- This was challenged by Shayara Banu, who was thus divorced. The court was
asked to rule if this practice was indeed valid.

\- The court declared 3/2 against this being a core part of Islam, and that
the practice itself is cruel, and unconstitutional.

For most, this is a victory of simple decency. There are worries that this
should have been legislatively dealt with rather than judicially, but on-the-
ground truth is that politics of appeasement would mean this option is
potentially long and arduous. Right now, muslim women no longer have to worry
about instant divorce thanks to this ruling.

~~~
moh_maya
[quote] For most, this is a victory of simple decency. There are worries that
this should have been legislatively dealt with rather than judicially, but on-
the-ground truth is that politics of appeasement would mean this option is
potentially long and arduous. Right now, muslim women no longer have to worry
about instant divorce thanks to this ruling. [/quote]

Apropos this, the 1978 Shah Bano case [1] is relevant.

Though the supreme court (in 1978) had ruled the practice illegal, the ruling
majority at that time reversed the court's judgement. The political
dispensation since then has changed, with the current government advocating
against the practice.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohd._Ahmed_Khan_v._Shah_Bano_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohd._Ahmed_Khan_v._Shah_Bano_Begum)

------
mhogomchungu
I am a christian Tanzanian in Tanzania and i though this was a Muslim thing
and not something specific to india as this article and wikipedia[1] suggests.

My understand as it was explained in detail by a muslim here in Tanzania is
that if a Muslim man divorces his wife once or twice,he can get her back with
little effort since they are still semi-married. Its called "talaka" in
swahili and its a simple note a man gives a woman as he sends her to her
family and she is to use it as proof that he no longer wants her.

But if he divorces her three times,she will have to first be married to
somebody else and then divorced before he can get her back and he will have to
start from zero and go through all the process of marrying her as if they were
never married.

Therefore, a muslim man who has never divorced his wife will issue the 3
divorces at the same time ONLY if he is 100% sure he will never,ever,ever want
her back and he does not want to be talked out of it.

The above is my understanding of the 3 divorces as its practiced here in
Tanzania.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_Talaq_in_India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_Talaq_in_India)

------
pas
Misleading title, the BBC's would have been much better: "India court bans
Islamic instant divorce" (though it doesn't imply that it was a supreme court
decision, yet it was)

------
amrrs
The whole subject has been a mess because of some idiotic Islamic Boards in
India. Talaq is the divorce initiated by Husband while Kula is the divorce
initiated by Wife. After the first time Talaq, if the Husband-wife duo wants
to live again, they can live together - a married life - without officially
getting married again and for them to be completely separated - which means,
if they want to live a married life again, they've to officially get married -
after such Talaq happening Thrice.

Living Together -> Talaq -> Living Together -> Talaq -> Living Together ->
Talaq: Permanent Divorce.

But some modern idiots came up with this concept of Triple Talaq which lets
the Husband tells his wife 'Talaq, Talaq, Talaq' and hence done their
permanent divorce. Triple Talaq isn't Islamic and when I mean Islamic, I refer
back to Quran and Hadith/Sunnah (Life of Prophet Muhammad). But Indian Muslims
even clerics being dumb and ignorant not referring to Quran/Hadith, has
approved this idiotic Instant Triple Talaq.

I wish some Indian Media had explained this difference better rather than
calling ignorant Clerics words as Islamic.

~~~
Quarrelsome
Islam has schools of thought that permit a council of local elders to handle
cases not explicitly covered in the Quran/Hadith, that's part of why Islam
spread so far.

Not every interpretation of Islam is toward the dogmatic Salafism where one
can say what is and isn't Islam with showboating authority. All of this is
Islamic, otherwise we're playing "no true Scotsman".

Just the same way that Westbro Baptist Church ARE Christian whether the Pope
likes it or not.

------
alkonaut
Why was the existing law problematic from an equality viewpoint? Why not make
anyone able to divorce on a whim, it can't get more equal than that?

------
AnkleInsurance
India will never prosper until it casts Islam aside. They have a space program
but shit on the ground, it doesn't make any sense.

~~~
dang
Religious flamewar is not allowed on HN. We ban accounts that post like this.
Your other comments with this account so far are good, so we won't ban you for
this one. But would you please take care not to post uncivil, unsubstantive,
and/or flamebait comments?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
sidcool
Not in favor of politics here on HN, but this is good news nevertheless (I am
an Indian).

The title is a bit misleading. The instant divorce was not a part of the
Constitution, but only the Muslim Personal Law.

~~~
candiodari
> the Muslim Personal Law.

This refers to Indian law allowing muslims to live under sharia for family
matters.

The rule itself is referred to as "triple talaq" and is part of sharia. In
Sunni islam, basically men can abandon women, without any (any) limit
immediately and without consequences (they get to take possession of
everything the woman owns as well). They can take the kids if they want,
including kids that have been conceived but not born yet (technically they
should take the kids, but that's not what happens in practice).

Women face progressively harsher physical punishments for abandoning a man. If
they remarry without his permission, they face (extra cruel) execution
(stoning, often with the kids and family forced to watch).

Edit: links

[http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/05/tripple-
ta...](http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/05/tripple-talaq-triple-
divorce-170511160557346.html)

The problem with wikipedia articles is that they try to bury the message in
detail. Read it through 5 times and you'll slowly realize what the rule is:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divorce_in_Islam#Talaq_al-
bid....](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divorce_in_Islam#Talaq_al-
bid.27ah_and_triple_talaq)

TLDR: in mainstream Sunni islam what I said is true. Allowing women
contractual divorce is a Shi'a practice, and not practiced by >85% of muslims
worldwide (what is it ?Essentially a prenup allowing for divorce under stated
circumstances, which cannot be initiated directly by the woman). Once you look
up the numbers, you'll see that the worst kind (the pure triple talaq) is
followed by some ~80% of muslims worldwide, and the contractual thing is an
exception for Shi'a only (and is one of the main stated reasons of recent
Sunni genocides against Shi'a in the middle east). You'll see that the text
does in fact say the overwhelming majority follows the worst practice, but not
on your first read.

These statements in wikipedia are true, but they're true like saying "your
phone company cannot just terminate your service", which is true. And then
give the entire contract and details on how this contract is affected by 5
different jurisdictions, which is of course the entire rule. But all it serves
is to cloud the issue.

Of course, in all realistic circumstances, your phone company can in fact just
tell you to fuck off without so much as giving a reason.

~~~
tokenmuslim
> The rule itself is referred to as "triple talaq" and is part of sharia. In
> Sunni islam, basically men can abandon women, without any (any) limit
> immediately and without consequences.

It's worth noting that there is no consensus on the validity or meaning of
triple talaq within Sunni Islam.

> they get to take possession of everything the woman owns as well

This is not true, I guess you are confusing it with a khula divorce in which
the woman requests that the man divorce her. In this case, she has to give
back the mahr (bride price).

> They can take the kids if they want, including kids that have been conceived
> but not born yet (technically they should take the kids, but that's not what
> happens in practice).

In Islam kids stay with the woman if they are below a certain age, and men
take kids above a certain age.

> Women face progressively harsher physical punishments for abandoning a man.
> If they remarry without his permission, they face (extra cruel) execution
> (stoning, often with the kids and family forced to watch).

I'm not sure what you mean, a woman does not need to seek permission to
remarry from her ex-husband. Her current husband does need to give permission
for a khula _divorce_ , there are other kinds of divorce e.g. by a court in
cases of mistreatment or abandonment. Yes, in general only men are given the
right to divorce for no reason.

Stoning is the hadd punishment for adultery, i.e. sex with someone one is
_not_ married to.

~~~
candiodari
You are spreading misinformation with technically correct statements. Allow me
to correct them:

> It's worth noting that there is no consensus on the validity or meaning of
> triple talaq within Sunni Islam.

True (as I pointed out. The biggest divide is the Sunni-Shi'a divide). Now why
don't you answer: what does 85%+ of muslims think/follow (with the large
majority of the remainder being the Shi'a) ?

> This is not true, I guess you are confusing it with a khula divorce

We are not talking about khula divorce. Obviously, we are talking about a
talaq divorce, which has exactly the properties I said:

1) initiated by the man, no defense possible on the woman's part. Anytime,
anywhere, mostly immediate or VERY short term, women just gets thrown into the
street

2) there are NO financial obligations per se (it is ADVISED to provide money
if the man forces the woman to take care of the children, but this cannot be
enforced)

3) oh and feel free to point out that islam "advises against" divorcing this
way. That's like islam's advice about slaves.

> In Islam kids stay with the woman if they are below a certain age, and men
> take kids above a certain age.

True. At that age they are taken away and delivered to the man if he wants
that to happen.

> I'm not sure what you mean, a woman does not need to seek permission to
> remarry from her ex-husband.

Obviously she does. She needs the divorce to happen. The man does not. Given
the punishments I cited that was obvious.

