A bench comprising Justices Dalip Singh and Sajjan Singh
Kothari of the Rajasthan high court has stated that marriages based on
the right to choose, more generally known as love marriages, are
examples of “lust and greed”! The remark was one of a few abhorrent
statements of the bench on October 21, 2011 during its ruling in a
habeas corpus petition filed by Buddha Ram Meena, 34, whose 18-year-old
wife, Maina Bhatt, was forcibly taken back by her parents after they
heard about the marriage. The man was forced to file a habeas corpus
petition after his wife was taken away.
The division bench hearing habeas corpus petition No.
151/2011 (Buddha Ram Meena vs State of Rajasthan & Ors) rejected
the petition on the grounds that the marriage performed according to
Arya Samaj rites between the petitioner and his wife had sidestepped a
few essential rules titled ‘Arya Samajon Mein Vivah Ke Niyam’
issued by the Sarvadeshik Arya Pratinidhi Sabha in Delhi. But it is the
observations of the bench delivering the verdict that I find especially
disturbing.
The judges’ remarks, reported by PTI and published in
various newspapers on October 23, 2011, are worthy of closer
examination. The reports quoted the court as saying among other things
that: “The pious purpose of the Arya Samaj mission has been lost sight
at (sic) by local units in the state and they are becoming tool (sic)
for pacification of ‘greed and lust’ for girl and boy, and once it is
over the marriage lands in courts resulting in irreversible breakdowns”.
And that: “It takes them one hour to solemnise a marriage between an
18-year-old girl and a 38 or 40-year-old gentleman, which leaves scars
forever in the life of parents who bring up their children with great
passion and aspirations. Such marriages in lust and greed by young blood
cannot be said to be correct”.
Such insensitive statements by the distinguished judges
can only reinforce the prevailing mindset of those who wish to confine
society in its strong caste-based compartments.
Being a member of Dhanak, a group that has been working
on issues concerning couples in interfaith and inter-caste
relationships, for the past eight years, I would like to put forth the
reasons why most aspiring couples opt for religious solemnisation of
marriages rather than areligious solemnisation of marriages under the
Special Marriage Act 1954. It is important to mention that any
unmarried, sane, consenting adults (where the bridegroom is over 21
years of age and the bride is over 18 and who are unrelated within the
degrees of prohibited relationship), irrespective of faith or caste, can
get married under the Special Marriage Act. The couple from Rajasthan,
who come from an inter-caste background, could have done so too. So why
did they decide to have a religious marriage ceremony? It was almost
certainly because they wanted to make sure their parents did not receive
any intimation about their marriage through the official notice – as
would any couple who anticipated threats to their life and liberty.
When a couple belonging to different faiths or castes
decides to get married in the face of stiff sociopolitical opposition,
their first choice is invariably to exercise their constitutional rights
to marriage. However, in the majority of such cases, they are
discouraged from doing so and misled by the advocates and officials in
the marriage officer’s office. If the couple belongs to different
castes, they are never ever advised by the advocates to opt for marriage
under the Special Marriage Act. This is also true for couples of
different faiths, as they are also urged towards a religious
solemnisation of marriage based on their faith or religious beliefs, and
subsequent registration of the marriage on the basis of a marriage
certificate received from the officiating priest. There are two main
reasons for such advice. One is the personal faith- and caste-based
biases of the advocates and the concerned officials and the other is the
discouraging rules and practices associated with the implementation of
the Special Marriage Act.
Barring Delhi, all other states follow the dangerous
practice of sending a copy of the notice of intended marriage to the
permanent addresses of the marrying couples. Thanks to the initiatives
of the Delhi government and a landmark judgement by Justice S. Ravindra
Bhat of the Delhi high court in April 2009, the practice of sending
notices to the homes of couples desirous of solemnising their marriage
under the Special Marriage Act was curbed. However, it has not been
completely discontinued, as the officials fear the wrath of the parents
of marrying couples.
The administrations in Ghaziabad, Noida and Gurgaon in
the states of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana are not even willing to bear the
expenses of dispatching notices and they insist that couples provide
pre-addressed, pre-stamped envelopes beforehand. Couples also have to
publish an advertisement of their proposed marriage in a leading
newspaper and submit a copy of the published advertisement to the
marriage officer’s office. In Gurgaon, the concerned deputy
commissioner’s office has taken the pains to add a column for specifying
the applicants’ religion in the ‘Intent to Marry’ form and an additional
point about the citizenship of the applicants in the declaration form. I
wonder why religion should be mentioned at all in the one legally
recognised marriage procedure intended to be outside the realms of faith
or caste.
The Gurgaon office also requires that couples provide
envelopes bearing the names and designations of the marriage officers in
districts where the applicants permanently reside. I can only speculate
on the amount of homework a couple has to do before they file their
application. A marriage cannot be solemnised under the Special Marriage
Act without receipt of a verification report from the concerned
tehsildar; and the report will not, of course, be issued as a matter of
routine. The couple has to take great pains to ensure that the report is
in fact released by the tehsildar’s office.
Looking at just a few of the requirements essential for
marriage under the Special Marriage Act, one can safely say that no
couple would choose to go through the traumatic experience on its own.
So those couples who are still determined to get married under the
Special Marriage Act are forced to engage an advocate and shell out a
large sum of money for his/her fees. Unfortunately, the majority of
couples cannot afford the services of an advocate and thus, confronted
by various hostile and complex sociopolitical pressures, they are forced
to opt for a religious form of marriage. Here too they are misguided and
cheated by the concerned persons for economic or faith-based gains, as
it happened in the case of the aforementioned couple from Rajasthan.
The judges’ presumption that all such marriages end in
divorce reveals a limited understanding of the complexities of married
life for couples who challenge the conventional form of marriage. By
branding these marriages as “tools for pacification of greed and lust”,
the judges have literally abused the essential emotional component in
any form of love marriage – the love itself. Surprisingly, the judges
have been sympathetic towards the emotions and the suffering of the
parents but have completely overlooked the similar feelings of the
children vis-ŕ-vis their parents. Here I would like to state that no
couple willingly seeks the absence of blessings from their dear parents
and respectable elders at the time of their marriage. They all wish to
cherish the love, care and support they have received from their parents
throughout their lives – those marrying for love (under the Special
Marriage Act or otherwise) do so just as much as couples who marry under
any other form of marriage.
I believe the court should also have taken cognisance of
the existing hostility of officials in the administrative bodies
responsible for the solemnisation and registration of areligious
marriages. I sincerely hope that the administrations responsible for
solemnisation/registration of such marriages take serious note of this
situation and consider it an absolute failure of their performance.
Unless the various governments and groups working on religious/caste
coexistence take the initiative in easing the process of marriage
solemnisation/registration, we cannot build a society free from
religious and casteist hegemonic stereotypes.
