Muslim marriage and divorce registration law scrapped in Assam
Headlines
- Big announcement by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma
- Muslim marriage and divorce registration law scrapped
- The bill will come in the assembly in the next session
The BJP government of Assam has repealed the Muslim Marriage and Divorce Registration Act. Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma announced this on Thursday. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday announced that the Assam Cabinet has decided to repeal the Muslim Marriage and Divorce Registration Act and Rules 1935 through the Assam Repeal Bill 2024. He said that this is an important step towards ensuring justice for our daughters and sisters by taking additional protection measures against child marriage.
Assam CM gave information
Sharing the government’s decision on X, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma called it “an important step to ensure justice”. He said, “We have taken an important step to ensure justice for our daughters and sisters by providing additional protection against child marriage. In today’s meeting of the Assam Cabinet, we have decided to repeal the Assam Muslim Marriage and Divorce Registration Act and Rules 1935 through the Assam Repeal Bill 2024.”
The bill will come in the assembly in the next session
The bill will be tabled for consideration in the next monsoon session of the Assam Assembly. The Assam Cabinet has also said that a suitable law should be brought for the registration of Muslim marriages in the state, which will be considered in the next session of the Assembly.
Decision after Assam CM’s claim
The development comes a day after Sarma claimed that the Muslim population in Assam now stands at 40 per cent and said demographic change is a “big issue” in the northeastern state. “I come from Assam and demographic change is a big issue for me. The Muslim population in my state is now 40 per cent, up from 12 per cent in 1951. This is not a political issue for me but a matter of life and death,” Sarma, the BJP’s co-in-charge for Jharkhand polls, said on the sidelines of a party meeting in Ranchi.
What will change
The repeal of the law will bring several changes, including banning child marriage, making registration compulsory and abolishing the Kazis (marriage and divorce registrars). Section 8 of the Act provided that if either the bride or the groom or both are minors, the application for registration of marriage must be made by their lawful guardians – this will now be abolished after the repeal of the law.