By TwoCircles.net staff reporter
New Delhi: There is no scope for a maintenance allowance in case of a defective nikah, said Muslim Ulema and Islamic scholars, reacting to a Supreme Court verdict on the marriage of a man with two sisters at the same time.
As the nikah was defective (Islamic Shariah prohibits marriage of a person with two sisters at the same time), no question arises for a maintenance allowance, said the Ulema including Dr. Mufti Mohammad Mukarram Ahmad, Imam of Shahi Masjid of Fatehpuri in the capital.
The Supreme Court on 15th March ordered one Chand Patel (who had married two sisters at the same time) to pay maintenance allowance to Bismillah Begam, sister of Mushtaq Bi who was already married to Patel. The court said that if a Muslim person marries two sisters at a time, he will be required to pay maintenance allowance to both wives and it will not be sufficient for him to declare that the second marriage is void. The bench which included Justice Al-Tamash Kabeer said in its verdict that such a marriage could be defective but not void. Therefore, according to article 125 of IPC, his second wife, like his first wife, has the right to claim maintenance allowance from Patel.
The Court also said in its verdict that so far as Hanafi Muslims are concerned, it is accepted among them that maintenance allowance will be payable in case of defective marriage until the marriage gets dissolved legally. Supreme Court ordered the husband, Chand Patel, to pay all dues of his second wife.
Reacting to this verdict, Mufti Mukarram said Quran forbids marrying two sisters simultaneously. In such a case, Nikah with a sister of present wife will be defective, and so there cannot a provision of payment of any maintenance allowance to the second woman. He further said no interference should be made in the Islamic law of nikah, talaq and inheritance. He advised All India Muslim Personal Law Board to explain the Shariah law in this case.
Expressing his views on the issue, Maulana Abdul Hameed Nomani, secretary of Jamiat Ulama-i-hind, said there is no maintenance allowance payable in case of a defective nikah, neither during Iddah (waiting period) nor thereafter. He said marriage with wife’s real sister in her presence is defective and it is necessary to separate them. He said Chand Patel committed Haram (prohibited act) by marrying two real sisters simultaneously.
Prof. Akhtarul Wasey, head of the Islamic Studies department at Jamia Millia Islamia, said that neither any person like Chand Patel in present case has any right to appeal to Muslim personal law nor any concession could be granted in this connection because he has expressly violated Islamic Shariah by marrying two real sisters simultaneously. He is a culprit in view of the Islamic Shariah. He said a case of fraud should be filed against this person because he would have not disclosed to the Qazi that the woman he was marrying was sister of his wife.