Triple Talaq : Centre promulgates ordinance after failing to get Rajya Sabha’s approval
NEW DELHI : President Ram Nath Kovind has approved re-promulgation of the Triple Talaq ordinance.In a Ministry of Law and Justice notification, the government said, President Ram Nath Kovind has promulgated The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Ordinance, 2019.
The government on Saturday promulgated a fresh ordinance to make the practice of instant triple talaq a penal offence after its legislation failed to get the Parliament’s approval during the Winter Session. Muslim men use the practice to divorce their wives by uttering talaq three times in spoken or written forms.
The ordinance seeks to protect the rights of married Muslim women and criminalise the practice of triple talaq. The President has also re-promulgated Companies Amendment Ordinance 2019 and Indian Medical Council Amendment Ordinance 2019. Amid the row over the non-passage of the Triple Talaq Bill in the Rajya Sabha in the recently-concluded Winter Session of Parliament and the triple talaq ordinance which is about to get lapsed later this month, the central government on Saturday repromulgated the ordinance. The ordinance was approved by the Cabinet during a meeting on January 10.
The Opposition had demanded that the legislation undergo scrutiny of a parliamentary committee. The Congress and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazagham members had walked out in protest during the voting in the Lok Sabha. The government lacks a majority in the Rajya Sabha.
An ordinance lapses if the Parliament does not pass a law to replace it within six weeks of reassembling.
Under the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Ordinance, 2019 issued by the current National Democratic Alliance government, the practice of giving instant triple talaq (talaq-e-biddat) will become unlawful and void. Anyone indulging in it will face a jail term of three years.
The triple talaq ordinance aims at making the Islamic practice of instant divorce a penal offence. The ordinance was reissued as the Narendra Modi government failed in its bid to get it converted it into law. While the Lok Sabha has passed the Bill on triple talaq, the move got stuck in the Rajya Sabha.
An ordinance is valid for a period of six months unless re promulgated. However, the ordinance has to be replaced by a bill which should be cleared by Parliament within 42 days (six weeks) of the start of the session, otherwise, it lapses. The proposed law will empower women to approach a magistrate and seek custody of minor children, along with seeking ‘subsistence allowance’ for them and their children, news agency PTI reported.
The women will be made entitled to financial assistance, and three new amendments have been introduced, on the recommendation from the opposition earlier, that will ensure that the proposed law will not be misused.
(With Agency Inputs ).
