By TwoCircles.net reporter,
New Delhi: All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) is not against the registration of marriages in principle, but it strongly opposes compulsory registration of marriages, said assistant general secretary and spokesman of the AIMPLB, Mohammad Abdur Rahim Qureshi.
AIMPLB is a religious body which looks after the matters of Muslim personal laws which include issues like marriage, divorce, inheritance etc.
Explaining the point further Qureshi said that the opposition to the compulsory registration of marriages is not on any religious ground, rather AIMPLB opposes this proposal because of the probable plight and burden of fines falling on Indian populace residing in far flung villages and remote areas, irrespective of their religion.
So the AIMPLB realizes that if registration of marriages is made compulsory, a considerable chunk of population, including Hindus and Muslims, will become a victim of troubles and difficulties, Qureshi continued.
He said the registration system is presently available only at district, taluka (sub division) and block level. It makes it almost impossible for poor villager, agricultural labor and petty traders to come to these places and stay for four or five days along with two witnesses required for registration of marriages.
This is the reason that, in spite of passage of Compulsory Marriage Registration Act in Maharashtra in 2002, it could not be enforced in non-urban areas till date.
AIMPLB also maintains that Qazis maintain a register of marriages containing all necessary details of Muslims’ marriages, therefore, these persons should be brought into the ambit of the law of marital registration and their records should be deemed as registration of a marriage. This will solve the purpose without any difficulty, Qureshi said.
Qureshi said some newspapers have raised the issue of ‘old leadership’ of AIMPLB, referring to its president Maulana Syed Mohammad Rabey Hasani Nadvi. It is regrettable that the news was released by a reputed news agency UNI whereas this issue was discussed neither in Kolkata session of the board nor in Delhi session that was chaired by the president on July 6.