LUCKNOW (PTI): At first, it just appeared to be a case of an abandoned women seeking justice. Now, it threatens to erupt as a national controversy.
Hamidan’s husband abandoned her for another woman and she was left to fend for herself and her two children.
She went to the family court of Lucknow for maintenance but being a Muslim, she was allowed maintenance only for three months and 13 days, the ‘Iddat’ (contract) period described in the Shariat (Muslim law based on the Quran) the only exception being pregnancy.
The judgment of the additional Judge made it clear that divorced Muslim woman, as per Muslim personal law, can get maintenance only for such a period or till she remarried.
But Hamidan was made of a different metal, She appealed to the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court has upheld her plea. In the February 10 Judgment, the court held that the right of maintenance of a Muslim woman under the criminal procedure code is not restricted to Iddat but continued till she remarries.
Despite being under much pressure to withdraw her case, she today beckons “all her such unfortunate sisters to move out and fight for their legitimate rights.
Seven years after the Shah Bano case, Hamidan’s courageous fight has, once again, stirred the same Homet’s nest.
In 1986, as a consequence of an agitation by a section of Muslims against the decision of the Shah Bano case where the Supreme Court had awarded maintenance 10 a divorced Muslim wife holding that there was no conflict between Muslim law and Constitutions of personnel law and CR PC in case of a neglected woman who is unable to maintain herself.
Indian Parliament passed an act known as Muslim women (protection of rights on divorce) act in 1986, It came into force from May 1986.
Article extracted from this publication >> February 19, 1993
