With the right-wing groups’ coined term of “love jihad” taking stride in the nation, the country had witnessed two of its state governments indicating their plans to bring in laws for tackling the so-called serious issue.
In a bid to do the same, Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Narottam Mishra told in a statement today that the MP government is going to introduce legislation to curb the growing problem in the state soon. The statement comes weeks after the state governments of Haryana and Karnataka had voiced seeking similar options.
According to the minister, the bill pertaining to fight “love jihad” might be presented in the assembly due to be held next. He also added that while the punishment for the act will be 5 years of harsh imprisonment, it will also be registered as a non-bailable offence under appropriate sections of IPC.
Moreover, the bill also proposes to consider the collaborator or supporter in this crime as guilty as the prime accused. The minister however said that if a person decides to get converted voluntarily for getting married, it will be a compulsion for them to register to the collector atleast a month in advance.
Earlier in the year, the Centre had refused to identify “love jihad” as a word defined in the Indian legislation’s existing laws. It also added that no case had been registered in connection to the same by any of the central agencies. This marked as the first time when the central government had detached itself from the rightwing opinion holders’ idea of specific religions and people using marriage as a means to convert women to their religion.
Nevertheless, some state governments continued to stay linked with the philosophy like the Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa who said on November 6th that they were determined to introduce laws against religious conversion under the “love jihad” regime.
Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij, on the same day, announced in the state assembly regarding the state’s plans to bring in a law as such. He added that the government has sought details from the Himachal Pradesh government on the matter as the HP assembly had passed a bill on the issue last year. This bill included punishment against conversion by force, inducement or by marriages formalized only to convert to a new religion.
The matter gained momentum and attention after the Allahabad High Court put forth its statement of non-acceptance of religious conversions made solely for getting married. The UP court’s stance was in correlation to its earlier order where it had refused to offer help to the couple who filed a petition for protection.
The case was of a Hindu man and a Muslim woman who had converted to Hinduism for marriage. The couple then reached the court to seek protection from the authorities after their relatives were troubling them post marriage.
However, the court said that the conversion was made only the purpose of marriage as it happened exactly a month and 2 days before the solemnization. This, the court said, was not acceptable and dismissed the couple’s plea.
