Supreme Court will consider larger bench on nikah-halala'

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday said it would consider setting up of a five-judge Constitution bench to examine the validity of the prevalent practices of polygamy and “nikah halala” among the Muslims.

The apex court, which on August 22 last year had banned the age-old practice of instant “triple talaq” among Sunni Muslims, had on March 26 this year decided to refer to a larger bench a batch of pleas challenging the constitutional validity of polygamy and “nikah halala” among Muslims.

“We will look into it,” a bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra said, adding that they will be listed for hearing before the Constitution bench after the Centre files its response.

While polygamy allows a Muslim man to have four wives, “nikah halala” deals with the process in which a Muslim woman, who wants to re-marry her husband after divorce, has to first marry another person and get a divorce from the second person after the consummation.

Additional solicitor general Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, said the government will file its response to the petitions.  

The development assumes significance as the Centre has recently made it clear that it would oppose in the Supreme Court the practice of “nikah halala” when the top court would examine its legal validity in the coming days.

The court’s observation came when senior lawyer V. Shekhar and advocate Ashwini Kumar Updhayay, appearing for Delhi-based Sameena Begum, sought urgent hearing of her petition, alleging she has been threatened by her in-laws to either withdraw the petition from the apex court or get thrown out of the matrimonial home.

“We will list her petition along with other petitions,” the bench, also comprising Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and D.Y. Chandrachud, said.

The lawyers said that earlier, the petitions were shown in the advance cause list of business of the Supreme Court but later they got deleted, which led them to mention them for urgent listing.

The top court on March 26 had referred to a five-judge bench the petitions challenging the constitutional validity polygamy and “nikah halala” among the Muslims.

It had considered the submission that an earlier five-judge Constitution bench, in its 2017 verdict, had kept open the issue of polygamy and ‘nikah halala’, while quashing the practice of “triple talaq”.

It had then issued notices to ministries of law and justice and minority affairs as well as the NCW  after taking note of the pleas on the issues of polygamy and “nikah halala”.