UP anti-conversion law applies not only for marriage but also for live-in relationships: Allahabad High Court

The court said conversion is not only required for the purpose of marriage but it is also required in all relationships in the nature of marriage.

Lucknow: In a significant ruling, the Allahabad High Court has said that the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021 applies not only to married couple but also to live-in partners.

A single bench of the court, comprising Justice Renu Agarwal, gave the ruling while dismissing a petition filed by a live-in interfaith couple seeking police protection.

A Muslim woman and a Hindu man had married in a temple and applied for the registration of their marriage online, which was pending. The couple had approached the high court seeking police protection as they apprehended threats to their lives.

''Conversion is not only required for the purpose of marriage, but it is also required in all relationships in the nature of marriage, therefore, the Conversion Act applies to relationships in the nature of marriage or live-in relationship. The petitioners have not yet applied for conversion as per provisions of Section 8 and 9 of the Act, hence, the relationship of petitioners cannot be protected in contraventions of the provisions of law,'' the court said in its ruling delivered recently.

The court said that the Act had made it mandatory for interfaith couples to seek conversion according to the provisions. However, in this case, none of the petitioners has moved an application for religious conversion.

The couple had also moved an application before the Senior Superintendent of Police, Varanasi, seeking protection but no action was taken by the police authorities.  

Uttar Pradesh was the first state to have a law against religious conversion through deceit, force, allurement or any other fraudulent means or for the purpose of marriage. 

Although the Act nowhere used the term 'love jihad', BJP leaders have maintained that it is a law to prevent what they allege ''rising cases of Hindu girls being lured through fraudulent ways into marriage by Muslim youths''. 

The Act provides for a maximum of ten years imprisonment and a fine to the violators. It categorises religious conversion under certain circumstances as an offence. According to the Act, religious conversion, if done under duress, force, allurement, or any other fraudulent means or for the purpose of marriage would be an offence. 

Anyone intending to convert on one's own volition to marry would have to submit an application to the concerned district magistrate two month in advance.