INTRODUCTION
In Democratic India, a person has all means of right to choose which he want
to follow, what he want to do etc., the constitution of India has provided fundamental rights to every person in India irrespective of religion, caste, sex, race, creed or place of birth. India has tradition of arranged marriages from a long time, where bride and groom do not choose their partner.
Though after 2000 era there is rise in love marriages, also there is rise in inter caste marriages this led to rise in tensions between the religions and led to conflicts among them. Even though people who marry other caste lived and living happily in society. Due to some people for their own selfish reasons, their hatred towards love marriages led to social disturbances in the society. The allegations of love jihad had first rose in national level was in September 2009.
WHAT IS LOVE JIHAD?
Love jihad is an Islamophobic conspiracy raised by right wing Hindutva activists. It says that Muslim men target Hindu and Christian women in the name of love, marriage, abduction and forcefully convert them into their religion, decreasing Hindus population. To find the truth about these claims official investigations had been launched in 2009, 2010, 2012 and again in 2014 and found no evidence of the activity.
WHERE DID TERM LOVE JIHAD ORIGINATE
The term was first originated in south India i.e., in the states of Kerala and Karnataka. In 2009 the Catholic Church bodies of Kerala as well as Hindutva bodies of Karnataka has started claiming that thousands of women had been coerced into converting Islam.
In 2009 the Karnataka High court asked the Karnataka Police Crime Inspection Department (CID) to look into the allegations of love jihad in the marriage of 18 -year -old Hindu girl from Bengaluru to 24 -year- old Muslim man from Kerala. The Karnataka, then Director General of Police Ajay Kumar Singh said there was no proof for the claim, brought by the father.
The same year Kerala High court ordered the police to look into this matter. In 2012, the police declared there was no substance to the claims that love jihad was taking place.
BEGINNING OF LOVE JIHAD
According to the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti in Karnataka claimed 30,000 girls had been converted in Karnataka alone, in Kerala according to Catholic Bishops Council, by oct 2009 up to 4,500 girls had been targeted to convert them.
The love jihad controversy lit-up in 2009 later on continued 2010, 2011,2014 and so on. The Kerala Chief Minister stated on 25 June 2014 stated that 2,667 young women converted into Islam between 2006 to 2014, but found that there was no forceful conversion and love jihad were baseless.
DURING 2014 – PRESENT
During the ongoing controversy in 2014 protests turned violent. The then BJP MP yogi Adityanath alleged that this was international conspiracy targeting India, announcing on televisions that Muslims cannot do what they want by force in India.
After that Akhil Bharitiya Vaishya Ekta Parshid announced in Uttar Pradesh, to restrict the use of cell phones by the young women. Regarding love jihad, so many concerns raised by the feminists that the efforts to protect the women against the alleged activities would negatively impact women’s rights, depriving free choice and agency.
In 2014, BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj, claimed that Muslim boys in madrasas are motivated for love jihad with rewards, 11lakhs for an affair with Sikh girl, 10 lakhs for Hindu girl and 7 lakhs for a Jain girl. He claimed to know this information through reports to him by Muslims and from his men.
HADIYA CASE
In may 2017, the Kerala High Court annulled the marriage of converted Hindu woman Akhila alias Hadiya to Muslim man Shafeen Jahan on the grounds that bride parents were not present nor gave the consent for the marriage.
The supreme court on 8 march 2018 overturned the annulment of Hadiya’s marriage by the Kerala High court and held that she had married on her will. However continued investigation by NIA, it examined 11 inter faith marriages and not found any evidence that any man or women was coerced to convert.
UNLAWFUL RELIGIOUS CONVERSION ORDINANCE,2020
This law is referred to as love jihad law, is anti-conversion law enacted by the Government of Uttar Pradesh on November 2020. This law is made to provide prohibition of unlawful conversion from one religion to another by means of coercion, misrepresentation, forcefully, undue influence, allurement or any other fraudulent means or by marriage and matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.
The law makes religious conversion non-bailable up to 10 years of jail time if undertaken unlawfully, allurement, forcefully or any other means. This makes mandatory religious conversions for marriages in UP has to be approved by the District Magistrate.
The ordinance was passed days after the CM yogi Adityanath government launched “MISSION SHAKTI” a campaign for the safety and security of women in state.
FIRST CONVICTION
The first conviction under the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act,2021 a Muslim youth in the state Amroha district, sentenced to five-year prison for attempting to marry a Hindu girl under false pretenses by concealing his religion.
CRTITICISM ON THE ACT
Numerous experts including Human Right’s activists, common people opposed the law and described law as unconstitutional including former law Commission chairmen Justice A.P Shah &former Supreme Court judge Madan Lokur.
The law restricting the women’s right to choose their partner and denying the right to freedom of religion. In December 2020, 104 former bureaucrats have written an open letter to CM Adityanath, asking him to repeal law. They alleged that UP has become the midst of political hate, segment and dogmatism and the institutions of administration are steeped into communal poison.
After Uttar Pradesh, in December 2020, Madhya Pradesh also approved an anti-conversion law similar to the Uttar Pradesh. By 25 November 2020, Haryana and Karnataka were still in discussion over similar ordinance. The Gujarat Assembly in April 2021, amended the Freedom of Religion Act, 2003, bringing in inflexible provisions against forcible conversion through marriage or allurement, with the intention of targeting “love jihad”. After that The Karnataka state cabinet, approved an anti-conversion ‘love jihad’ bill, making it a law in December 2021.
REVERSE LOVE JIHAD
In response to purported conspiracy of love jihad, affiliates of the RSS stated that they have launched a Reverse Love Jihad campaign to marry Hindu men with Muslim women. The cases relating to these are reported from various parts of Uttar Pradesh, where abduction and rape of women taken place.
The term reverse love jihad was even used by the Bajrang Dal to refer to love jihad conspiracy. And also, Bhagwa Love Trap Conspiracy Theory, alleges that Hindu men lure Muslim women into relationship with intention of converting them into Hinduism has been popularized on social media.
CONCLUSION
India is secular and Democratic country, where every person has right to choose their life partner and right to worship any religion of their choice as provided under fundamental rights. Although from some time due to inter religion marriages there is increasing in tension in between religions because due to after some time of marriage, women are forced to convert their religion, even forcefully sometimes without consent this led to conflicts.
But what we to see here is that it is not happening in every inter-religion marriage but in some only. To curb this we have to enact a legislation to protect women but not made a legislation to not to marry a other religion person as it is curtailing one’s fundamental country. By making this kind of ordinances /legislations led to create internal disturbances in the country lead to unrest between religions in the country. India is not a one religion country but instead it is made of many more i.e., unity in diversity. Constitution of India provided equality to all religions one is high no one is low, all are equal. So the states in country have to think twice before making these kind of legislations.
SUBMITTED BY :: P. SASI REKHA , FINAL YEAR B.A LLB
DR.BR AMBEDKAR COLLEGE OF LAW, ANDHRA UNIVERSITY
