On triple talaq, the political battle lines are drawn. The Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre wants to ban the Muslim personal law, which facilitates unilateral, instantaneous divorce, in the interests of secularism and gender equality. But the Trinamool Congress opposes the move to ban triple talaq, also in the interests of secularism.
Over the last few days, the Trinamool Congress has stepped up its attack on the proposed ban, saying it is the precursor to a Uniform Civil Code that seeks to replace scripture-based personal laws of each religious community in India with common laws that are binding on all citizens.
Trinamool Congress leaders are set to oppose the Uniform Civil Code in Parliament and will host a three-day conference in Kolkata from November 18 on its perceived negative effects. The conference will culminate with an All India Muslim Personal Law Board rally, raising political temperatures before the Winter Session of Parliament.
On Saturday, West Bengal Education Minister Partha Chatterjee and Urban Development Minister Firhad Hakim shared the stage with members of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind at a rally in Kolkata. Both leaders backed the Jamiat’s call to reject the Centre’s attempt to abolish triple talaq.
The “acche din” were over, Hakim said, referring to the BJP’s 2014 election slogan, and now there was an “attempt to mislead the people in the name of religion by tinkering with personal laws”. Chatterjee said the BJP could not a decide how a man and his wife should live. God and the Constitution would be the judge of it, and the BJP should not try to “plant a lotus in between”.
Both sides now
The BJP’s push against triple talaq is not entirely innocent of political calculations. At the first of the four “parivartan yatra” rallies that start off the BJP’s election campaign in Uttar Pradesh, which is due for elections early next year, the issue of triple talaq held pride of place. Speaking at the rally in Lucknow, also held on Saturday, party president Amit Shah aimed jibes at political rivals such as the Congress and the Samajwadi Party for “interfering with the development of women”. Already, detractors have accused the BJP of wielding the triple talaq issue as a tool to polarise the electorate.
While the BJP’s attempts to politicise triple talaq may well be criticised, the Opposition does not sound entirely disinterested either. The Trinamool Congress, in this case, opens itself up the old charge of appeasing minority votebanks for narrow political gains.
In West Bengal, where Muslims form about 28% of the population, the minority vote can swing elections. The Trinamool Congress first swept to power in 2011 by consolidating this votebank, and has kept a firm hold on it ever since. From the beginning of her tenure, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has courted the community with very public shows of munificence. Her government announced stipends for imams and development schemes for shrines, and has built Haj houses and new madrasa hostels.
But now there are rumblings that the chief minister has not fulfilled her promises, and 10,000 Muslim clerics are to hit the streets of Kolkata in protest on November 8. Besides, West Bengal never stopped being home to a low-lying communal tension, which occasionally rises to the surface in incidents like the clash between participants of Durga Puja and Muharram processions in North 24 Parganas in October. The growing presence of the BJP in the state seems to have exacerbated these tensions.
Perhaps a nervous Trinamool now feels the need to reiterate its support for the minority community.
Which voices?
In the rush to resist the BJP’s apparent war on minorities and plant a flag on the triple talaq issue, the Opposition, including the Trinamool Congress, may have worked itself into curiously regressive positions. It has largely sided with the chorus of elders and religious bodies that object to a triple talaq ban, ignoring the voices of Muslim women who will be affected the most but who are not represented in any of these bodies. It also ignores Muslim voices that argue that triple talaq has no sanction in Quranic law.
In the end, the political harangues over triple talaq may be little more than posturing. The courts, through successive judgments, have been chipping away at the arbitrary nature of the triple talaq provision for years. In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled that the pronouncement of triple talaq may be revocable. In 2007, the Bombay High Court ruled that merely saying the words talaq three times was not enough, clear reasons for divorce had to be provided.
The polarised political discourse hides the quieter changes that have taken place without the help of big-ticket legislation. It also shuts down a reasoned, substantive debate – one in which a range of Muslim voices are given agency – on whether triple talaq should stay or go.
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