The Shah Bano Case

In 1985, the Supreme Court gave a decision in a case involving a Muslim divorcee, Shah Bano, upholding the decision of a lower court. The lower court verdict was that Shah Bano’s erstwhile husband should pay her maintenance every month while Mohammed Ahmed Khan (the husband) contended that he had paid three months allowance as required, according to him, by Islamic law. Invoking Section

125 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), the apex court said that Shah Bano, not having remarried and not in a position to maintain herself, was entitled to get an allowance from the ex-husband. The court was clear that Section 125 of the CrPC would prevail over personal law in case there is a conflict between the two. The Supreme Court even went on to say that a uniform civil code, as mentioned in the Directive Principles of State Policy in the Constitution, would help national integration.

Conservative Muslims resented the court decision as interfering with their personal law. Sometime later, an MP moved a private member’s bill in Parliament to the effect that Muslims be exempted from the purview of Section 125 of the CrPC. This was opposed by Arif Mohammed Khan, the minister of state in the home ministry. The bill was defeated in the House. But dissatisfaction among a section of Muslims was deep. With thousands of Muslims demonstrating against the Supreme Court decision, the Rajiv Gandhi government bowed to the pressure. The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Bill was introduced in the House in 1986 to overturn the Supreme Court judgement and a whip issued to Congress MPs to vote in its favour. The bill was passed, thereby denying divorced Muslim women the right to claim maintenance under the CrPC and confining the maintenance to the iddat or a three- month period. The bill placed the onus of supporting the divorced wife on her relatives or the Wakf Board.

Arif Mohammed Khan resigned in protest.