Must respect decision of a couple: Top court

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday said it would always respect the decision of an adult couple to live together and would not investigate a marriage just because the man and the woman belong to different religions. “As a system and as an institution, we must respect the decision of a couple,” observed a bench of justices Uday U Lalit and Ajay Rastogi while refusing to entertain a petition by a woman’s parents, who claimed that their daughter, a Hindu, had been forcibly converted to Islam and married to a Muslim man against her will.

The habeas corpus petition by the parents alleged that the woman was illegally confined by the man and there must be an investigation into the circumstances of their alleged marriage after forceful conversion. But the court remarked: “As a system, we should not be prying into the privacy of a couple if a man and woman want to live together. We have to respect their decision as adults.”

The bench relied on a statement given by the woman to the police officers in Chandigarh where the couple lived together.

The counter-affidavit, filed by advocate Shantanu Sagar for the Union territory of Chandigarh, attached the statement written by the woman, stating that she is living with the man of her own her free will and there is no coercion.

The woman also said that her parents were against this alliance but she got married to the man in January and is now happily living with him.

The affidavit also adduced the couple’s marriage certificate registered in Jammu and Kashmir, which is the man’s home state, apart from their birth certificates that show the woman is 25 years old and the man 28.

“Look at her statement. She has reported to the police that she is married of her own will. Look at the way the letter has been written. The letters are all straight and there are no cuts. The letter shows its author is not under any kind of stress or coercion,” the bench said.

It asked the counsel for the parents if they were disputing her handwriting on the statement given to the police. “Since you are not doubting the handwriting, we cannot be of any assistance to you. A person, who is forced to make a statement, will not write like this. This is a clear case of a man or a woman being in complete sense and in control while writing a letter,” the bench told the parents’ counsel, Sudarsh Menon.