The Supreme Court has sought Centre’s response to a PIL seeking to make bigamy as an offence in all religions. The top court also agreed to take petitions challenging polygamy and Nikah Halala.
Section 494 of IPC states whoever has a husband or wife living marries in any case will be punished with a jail term of up to seven years, and liable to fine.
According to a TOI report, the Supreme Court bench has sent a notice to the Centre and has asked it to file a reply affidavit. If the court allows the relief mentioned in the PIL against bigamy, then it would ban polygamy under the Sharia Law.
In 2017, the SC declared triple talaq unconstitutional while considering the petition of Shayara Bano from Uttarakhand. Today, after five years, the five-judge bench comprising Justices Indira Banerjee, Hemant Gupta, Surya Kant, MM Sundresh and Sudhanshu Dhulia agreed to take up adjudication of other alleged discriminatory practices against Muslim women mentioned on a PIL filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhyay with six other petitions filed by Muslim women and a Muslim organisation.
The TOI reported that advocate Vishnu Jain drew the attention of the court while it was finalising the next schedule of hearing. Jain said the SC had not sought Centre’s response on the PIL filed by Kiran Singh who sought direction from the court to enforce Section 494 of IPC that punishes bigamy.
The six Muslim women and the PIL by Upadhyay challenged the practice of Nikah Halala where a divorced woman has to marry someone else and get a divorce to remarry her previous husband. Petitioners have alleged that such a practise was misused by men to torture women physically and mentally.
As told to TOI, additional solicitor general Madhavi Divan representing the Union government said there were several practices under challenge, which were not dealt in triple talaq case of Shayara Bano. The SC has to decide on issues including Nikah Halala, polygamy and other kinds of talaq.
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