by admin | May 25, 2021 | Opinions
By M. Burhanuddin Qasmi
The supreme court of India has allowed on 5 December 2017, certificates issued by Gram Panchayat (GP) or executive magistrate to be used as supporting or linkage documents for claiming citizenship by a person in Assam during NRC (National Registration of Citizenship) process.
The apex court has set aside the order of Gauhati high court dated 28 February 2017, by which it had invalidated these certificates for linking citizenship of an applicant to her or his Indian parent before 1971, the cut-off year in the Assam Accord 1985.
This sincere move of the apex court is historic and a massive booster for millions who have been living in fear and uncertainty. This is surely going to bring relief to lakhs of women and men in the state who used this document to establish linkage with their fathers and husbands. This Supreme Court verdict is also a major setback for present BJP-led Assam’s state and Delhi’s central governments.
In the meantime, the apex court has also put an end to the undemocratic and maliciously marked division of Indian citizens into original inhabitants (OI) and non-original inhabitants in the NRC list. This OI and other symbols are created by the state government within the final NRC list were bound to create rifts within Assamese society as some super citizens and other ordinary or second class citizens.
Thanks to the Supreme Court wisdom, it rightly struck in the heart of the issue and demolished the temple of divisive politicking in Assam with poor minority peasants and adivasis. It rightly observed that NRC is to prepare a list of Indian citizens and the constitution of India doesn’t make any distinction among its citizens. It was one more heavy blow to the present BJP governments both in the sate of Assam and in the Centre.
However, the leading petition under case No. 20858 of 2017 was filed by Rupajan Begum of Nogaon district and Monowara Bewa of Dhubri district in Assam. They had been marked as doubtful or ‘D-voter’ by their respective local election authorities; have yet to get complete relief. Their run to courts are still to over.
The foreigner tribunal court in Assam had discarded their documents, they were unable to prove their citizenship. The GP certificates were important document to establish their citizenship and linkage with parental families.
In the first stage the foreigner tribunal, and later the Gauhati high court, rejected the GP certificate and termed it as a “private document”. Harassed, they knocked the door of the Supreme Court with backing from All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) president and Dhubri MP Maulana Badruddin Ajmal led Assam State Jamiat Ulema-e Hind. Now the apex court has restored the applicability of the GP documents in establishing the linkage to other documents that prove citizenship.
Rupajan and Monowara have simply won a part of their long and painstaking struggle only. Their counsel and lawyers said that the appeal against their being detected as a ‘foreigner’ by the foreigner tribunal has not yet been decided.
This will, hopefully, be decided positively in the days to come by the ‘tribunal’ because the parental linkage document of their citizenship is now validated by the supreme sourt. But to avail this they will have to walk to the foreigner tribunal once more.
Many in Assam and elsewhere in India may find the apex court verdict a means to full on celebrations and greeting congratulations to each other. Here the real victims, the two poor women, have yet to feel complete relief. Their run to the court or tribunal, and their fear will not be over unless they are declared Indian citizens and the insulting tag “D-Voter” is struck off from their names in the electoral register and NRC list.
The author is editor of Eastern Crescent Magazine, a Mumbai based freelancer and a native of Assam.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Opinions
By M. Burhanuddin Qasmi
According to media reports that during the recent hearing of the alleged love jihad or hate Islam case in Delhi of a Muslim lady- Hadiya from Kerala in our Supreme Court dated 27 Nov. 2017. “When the bench asked Hadiya to name any relative or any near acquaintance to be named as her local guardian in college at Salem in Tamil Nadu, she said her husband could be her guardian and she does not want anyone else in that role.
“A husband cannot be a guardian of his wife. Wife is not a chattel. She has her own identity in life and society. Even I am not guardian of my wife. Please make her understand,’ Justice Chandrachud said.” [https://www.ndtv.com/kerala-news/wife-not-personal-property-husband-not-a-guardian-supreme-court-to-hadiya-1780827]
Well, a woman is not a CHATTEL, is an obvious fact, my lord. A father, mother or a near relative is a guardian of a child doesn’t mean the child is a CHATTEL either.
A wife is a wife. A sister is a sister. A mother is a mother. A daughter is daughter only. Any woman is simply a woman. How her guardianship by a male member would reduce her into a CHATTEL?
The honorable apex Court has asked the question about guardianship to Hadiya. She did not. Why would a free, adult, educated and sane woman need a guardian at all, if the Court considers to be in anyone’s guardianship is to be a CHATTEL for a wife or any kind of degradation on part of a dignified lady?
However, the Apex Court genuinely wanted an answer from Hadiya and wanted to give her in someone’s guardianship. That’s what its succeeding order revealed.
Let’s assume for a while now. Hadiya’s answer to the question on her guardianship was not what she gave. She, for instance, named her guardian someone other than her Muslim husband, say someone from her non-Muslim relatives. What would have been the honorable court’s reaction then? Would it object to it and argue saying ‘a woman is not a CHATTEL, thus guardianship is ruled out?
The court has granted Hadiya’s guardianship to the Dean of Sivaraj Medical College in Tamil Nadu!
Does it mean if a Dean is a guardian of a lady then she is not a CHATTEL but if her husband becomes her guardian then only she would be degraded into the status a CHATTEL and it would go against her ‘own identity in life and society’?
Personal freedom, freedom to profess a faith of one’s choice and freedom to marry a man or woman of individual choice with mutual consents are some of the rights, paramount in our constitution and hallmark of our secular democracy. It is striking to note that a husband and a wife cannot live together only because some other people are not happy with it!
The Supreme Court of India, the most high and the most gracious temple of respect and wisdom that we have in our great country. These questions are actually not going down well in common Indians.
Lady Hadiya is a Muslim. Her official husband is also a Muslim. Is it a crime to be a Muslim?
Muslim scholars say that it has been in their scriptures that a husband is fully and completely responsible for care-ship of his wife and children. They say, it is the duty of a husband to protect, feed and clothe his wife by all means possible. If he doesn’t take care of his wife for a reasonably long period of time, he even ceases to be a husband, the Muslim scholars and experts of family laws explain.
I am sure; the honorable apex court of India might know all these even better than many, for, this honorable court has been ensuring ‘nafqa’ (maintenance) by its orders for Muslim women divorcees from their previous husbands even beyond iddat periods, in some especial cases, on this very basis that husbands are caretakers of wives.
We are little confused as who can be a better guardian of a wife – the husband who is legally and religiously duty bound to take care of her in all aspects of life or the Dean of a college who takes charges for everything he provides to his student? We cannot and do not doubt the intention my lord, the honorable supreme court, but we are struggling to comprehend the wisdom of its CHATTEL theory against guardianship of a free, adult and sane woman vis-a-vis a Muslim wife!
