JOIN USThe Supreme Court on Monday stressed the need to stamp out religion from civil laws, saying India has been a secular country until now but it cannot be said how long it will remain so.
“India till now is a secular country...we don't know for how long [it] will continue to remain secular. We have to stamp out religion from civil laws. It is very necessary. There are already too many problems because of this,” a bench of Justices Vikramjit Sen and C Nagappan said.
Hearing a plea seeking validity to a divorce granted by a Christian court set up under their personal law, the apex court bench favoured keeping religion out of the civil laws. “Every religion will then say that we will decide how to carry out personal laws,” the bench pointed out to senior advocate Soli J Sorabjee.
Sorabjee, appearing for a PILpetitioner Clarence Pais, urged the bench to consider this question of law and religious freedom, claiming it impacted over one crore Indian Christians governed by the Canon Law on marriage and its dissolution.
The court, however, referred to honour killing as an example of the perils that religious or self-styled socio-political institutions could spawn in case they had legal backing.
“Look at the cases of honour killings. Then there is ostracisation of young boys and girls. You don't follow what they state as a law of the society and you get ostracised,” the bench said.
The PIL by 85-year-old lawyer Pais has sought a direction to all criminal courts in the country to recognise a decree of annulment of marriage granted by the “ecclesiastical courts/tribunal.”
If the dissolution of marriage by such courts was not held to be legally valid, thousands of Catholic Christian men could face criminal charges of bigamy, the petition had contended.
On Sorabjee's plea that if the court did not recognise marriage and its dissolution under the Canon Law, men will be exposed to the dangers of being prosecuted for bigamy, the bench said, “Of course, such cases can be filed.” “Ecclesiastical court is on one side and the civil law on the other and only the latter is recognised. Ecclesiastical court should only be for religious purposes,” the court said.
Additional Solicitor General Neeraj Kishan Kaul, appearing for the Centre, contended that the petition was not maintainable and the legal position was clear.
The court, however, granted four weeks time to the Centre to file its response to the PIL observing that the government may take help of directive principle of state policy, recommending uniform civil code to buttress its response.
The bench also asked the petitioner to submit a rejoinder in two weeks thereafter and posted the matter for consideration on April 8.