JOIN USWoman who filed first ‘love-jihad’ case in Gujarat wants FIR to be quashed
The woman, who had filed the first complaint under Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amended) Act, 2021, described by the Vijay Rupani government as “anti-love jihad law,” has approached Gujarat High Court, seeking withdrawal of the FIR she filed against her husband and seven others including in-laws and the qazi, the religious priest who performed the marriage, among others.
On Wednesday, the High Court issued notice to the state government and posted the matter for hearing on September 20.
Apart from the 25-year-old woman, her husband, and seven others have jointly moved the court for quashing the FIR.
The woman was also present in the court, where she confirmed to the judge that she wanted to settle the case. She has said that she and her husband have resolved the matter and want to continue living together and therefore, the FIR needs to be quashed.
The petition claims that the woman had filed a complaint with Vadodara police following a matrimonial dispute in April this year, which could have been covered under section 498A of Indian Penal Code that deals with domestic violence. However, according to the petition, the woman's complaint of marital dispute was allegedly twisted by the local police, who filed the FIR under the Freedom of Religion (Amended) Act, rape, unnatural sex, among other charges. She has said she had no idea about the new anti-conversion law back then and neither did she level any of these allegations against her husband and the in-laws.
However, the petition says, "certain religio-political groups intervened in the matter and communalised the said issue by bringing the angle of "love-jihad". Aso, on account of overzealousness of the police officers involved, facts and offences which were never mentioned or alleged by the informant (the woman) came to be inserted in the FIR."
"The petitioners most respectfully submit that contrary to the information's complaint regarding a trivial matrimonial dispute, the allegations in the impugned FIR have been communalized and sensationalised by overzealous police officers at the best of religio-political group," the petition reads. It says that "The male officers have recorded nasty information with explicit sexual details which were never uttered by the informant and even if uttered, ought to have been recorded by a woman police officer."
In June 17, the Vadodara police registered the case against her husband, a Muslim, her in-laws, witnesses and the religious priest. They were booked for forceful religious conversion, cheating into marriage, rape, unnatural sex, criminal conspiraeduled Cascy, and sections of Schtes and Scheduled Tribe (prevention of atrocities) Act, 1989. The woman had alleged that she met her husband through social media in 2019 and in February 2021, she got married under the special marriage act with the consent of their respective parents.
Two weeks after her lodgment of the FIR, she retracted her statement denying charges of forceful conversion, rape, among others. However, the lower court didn't entertain her statement and has refused bail to her in-laws. All the accused are still in judicial custody in jail.
Recently, the Gujarat high court stayed several sections of the controversial Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amended) Act, 2021 on the ground that these sections treat any interfaith marriage "a criminal" act. Since its implementation from June 15 this year, at least five FIRs have been registered in different parts of the state.