Supreme Court to hear plea filed by one, Nafisa Khan, on criminalisation of nikah halala and polygamy on March 26.

The Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by the lawyer, Ashwini Upadhyay, has also urged the apex court to declare both the practices as violation of fundamental rights. Further, the PIL also urged the top court to declare ‘Nikah Halala’ as rape under 375 IPC and declare ‘polygamy’, an offence under 494 IPC and also triple talaq, an offence under 498 IPC.

The practice of ‘Nikah Halala’ requires the divorced woman to marry someone else, consummate the marriage and then get a divorce in order to again marry her first husband under the Muslim personal law.  However, there are many cases where the practice has been misused and there are many social media pages and websites that offer halala marriage services to women who have been divorced by their first husband.

Last year, an India Today report stated that Islamic scholars charged a hefty amount for one night stands with divorced Muslim women looking to resuscitate their marriage.  One scholar, who is married even went to the extent and said that he doesn’t need to tell his wife to participate in Nikah Halala.