adjudication in religious family laws -...
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ADJUDICATION IN RELIGIOUS FAMILY LAWS
How do multireligious and multiethnic societies construct accommodative arrangements that can both facilitate cultural diversity and ensure wom-en’s rights? Based on a rich ethnography of legal adjudication of marriage and divorce across formal and informal arenas in Mumbai, this book argues that the shared adjudication model in which the state splits its adjudicative authority with religious groups and other societal sources in the regulation of marriage can potentially balance cultural rights and gender equality. In this model, the ideologically diverse lay, civic, and religious sources of legal authority construct, transmit, and communicate heterogeneous notions of the conjugal family, gender relations, and religious membership within the interstices of state and society. In so doing, they fracture the homogenized religious identities grounded in hierarchical gender relations within the con-jugal family. The shared adjudication model facilitates diversity as it allows the construction of hybrid religious identities, creates fissures in ossified group boundaries, and provides institutional spaces for ongoing intersoci-etal dialog. In this pluralized legal sphere, individual and collective legal mobilization by women spurs law reform and paves the way toward formal and substantive gender equality.
Gopika Solanki is assistant professor of political science at Carleton University in Canada. She is the coauthor of Journey from Violence to Crime: A Study of Domestic Violence in the City of Mumbai. She has con-tributed articles to various journals and books.
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CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN LAW AND SOCIETY
Cambridge Studies in Law and Society aims to publish the best scholarly work on legal discourse and practice in its social and institutional contexts, combining theoretical insights and empirical research.
The fields that it covers are studies of law in action; the sociology of law; the anthropology of law; cultural studies of law, including the role of legal discourses in social formations; law and economics; law and politics; and studies of governance. The books consider all forms of legal discourse across societies, rather than being limited to lawyers’ discourses alone.
The series editors come from a range of disciplines: academic law, socio-legal studies, sociology, and anthropology. All have been actively involved in teaching and writing about law in context.
Series Editors
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Books in the Series
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Continued after Index
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Adjudication in Religious Family Laws
CULTURAL ACCOMMODATION, LEGAL PLURALISM, AND GENDER EQUALITY IN INDIA
Gopika SolankiCarleton University
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Cambridge University Press32 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10013-2473, USA
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© Gopika Solanki 2011
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
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Printed in the United States of America
A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication dataSolanki, Gopika, 1970–
Adjudication in religious family laws : cultural accommodation, legal pluralism, and gender equality in India / Gopika Solanki.
p. cm. – (Cambridge studies in law and society)Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 978-1-107-00610-2 (hardback)1. Domestic relations – India. 2. Religion and law – India. 3. Legal polycentricity – India. 4. Justice, Administration of – India. I. Title. II. Series.KNS540.S64 2011346.5401 5–dc22 2010054306
ISBN 978-1-107-00610-2 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
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To my Mother, and Bapuji
and the memory of Ba
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ix
List of Figures page xvii
List of Tables xix
Preface xxi
Acknowledgments xxv
Abbreviations xxix
Glossary xxxi
1 Introduction 1
Who Shall Govern the Family? Outlining Two Approaches 5
Research Questions 9
Case Selection 9
A General Outline of the Developments in the Indian Case 11
The Study in the Indian Context 24
The Context of Inquiry 25
Research Site 29
Methods 29
Feminist Deliberations 31
Sampling in State Courts 32
Data Collection in State Courts 34
Sampling and Data Collection in Informal Courts 35
Organization of the Book 37
Contents
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CONTENTSx
2. The Shared Adjudication Model: Theoretical Framework and Arguments 41
Introduction 41
Theoretical Framework: State-Society Interactions at the
Interface of Personal Laws 42
Arguments 49
The Indian Model: Juristic Diversity in the Legal Landscape 50
Formal Legal Organizations and Actors: The Lower Courts 51
Legal Organizations and Actors in Society: An
Overview of Typologies, Structures, and Functions 52
Formal Organizations 52
The Doorstep Courts – Informal Associations,
Groups, and Networks 55
Individual Legal Actors 55
Interactions between State and Societal Organizations
and Actors 56
The Question of Legal and Extralegal Authority and
Accountability 56
An Open-Ended Conception of State-Society Relations
among Heterogeneous Legal Actors 60
The Paradoxical Movement between State Laws and
Societal Laws 60
The Centralization of Law in the Formal Legal System 61
Fragmentation and Societalization of Law in State Courts 63
Centralization of Law in Informal Legal Forums 64
The Decentralization of Law in Society 65
Characterizing the Legal Landscape: Legal Flexibility,
Fragmentation, and Change 66
Dispelling Myths about Contesting Areas in Hindu and
Muslim Personal Laws: Not So Different After All? 66
Balancing Cultural Accommodation and Gender Justice 68
Normative Heterogeneity and Cultural Accommodation:
Making and Unmaking Religious Communities, the
Conjugal Family, and Gender 69
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CONTENTS xi
Preventing the Ossification of the Boundaries of
Religious Groups 69
Accommodating Intragroup Difference and Facilitating
Intersocietal Dialog 70
Making and Unmaking the Conjugal Family 72
Hindu and Muslim Personal Laws and the Question of
Gender Equality 74
Conceiving Agency and Its Limit 78
The Agency of Litigant Women 78
Individual Women’s Agency: Forum Switching and
Gender Justice 79
Structural Change through Individual Agency: Hindu
and Muslim Women Litigants and Changes in
Personal Laws 80
Envisaging Legal Change through Collective
Socio-Legal Processes 82
Women’s Transformative Collective Agency in
Contouring the Socio-Legal Processes in Society 83
Women’s Transformative Collective Agency: Everyday
Processes of Adjudication and Visions of Change 85
The Question of Gender Equality in the Shared
Adjudication Model 88
Conclusion 89
3. State Law and the Adjudication Process: Marriage, Divorce, and the Conjugal Family in Hindu and Muslim Personal Laws 91
Introduction 91
The Functioning of the Family Court 92
An Overview of Cases Filed in the Family Court 95
The Disposal of Cases in the Family Court 97
The Nature of Justice in the Family Court: Consensual
Rather than Adversarial? 100
Adjudication in Hindu and Muslim Personal Laws 104
Determining “Marriage” – Outlining Boundaries of the
Community, Protecting Individual Rights 104
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CONTENTSxii
Void and Voidable Marriages: Streamlining Family
Laws and Protecting Individual Rights 109
The Provision of Restitution of Conjugal Rights and the
Standardization of Hindu and Muslim Personal Laws 114
The Regulation of Polygyny under Hindu and Muslim
Personal Laws 116
Divorce in Hindu and Muslim Personal Laws 120
Divorce under Muslim Personal Law: The Debate over
Triple Talaq 131
Divorce under Muslim Personal Law: Issues in Statutory
Divorce 137
Women and Property in Marriage and Divorce Laws 139
Legal Provisions Applicable to Hindu and Muslim
Women under State Laws 139
Maintenance and Alimony under Hindu Personal Law 141
Muslim Women’s (Protection of Rights on Divorce)
Act 1986 145
Maintenance under Section 125 CrPC 151
Implementation of Maintenance Orders 158
Injunction for Property 162
Negotiating the Retrieval of Stridhan 168
Conclusion 172
4. Making and Unmaking the Conjugal Family: The Administration of Hindu Law in Society 175
Introduction 175
Caste Formation and Lawmaking among Meghwals 177
Migration to Mumbai and the Statist Construction of the
“Caste” 178
Nationalist Movement, Naming the Community, and
Attempts at Lawmaking 181
Exposure to Democratic Politics, Creating Structures of
Governance, Constructing Identity through Laws 184
Democratizing Panchayats, Civic Awareness, and Law
Reforms: From the Panch System to the Panchayat 187
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CONTENTS xiii
Attempts at Repoliticization and the Conflict over Caste
Constitution 189
The Decade of the 1990s: Consolidating the Caste
Identity, Social Regulation, and Lawmaking 192
Summary of the Constitutional Provisions: Commonalities,
Continuities, and Discontinuities 195
The Gendered Sphere among the Meghwals 198
Innovative Legal Process: Democratic Participatory
Justice 200
Structure and Organization of the Meghwal Caste
Panchayat 202
Process of Adjudication in the Meghwal Caste
Panchayat and the Provision for Appeal 202
Similarities, Dissimilarities, and Hybridity in State Law
and Nonstate Law 203
Who Is a Hindu, Who Is a Meghwal? 203
Consent 205
Differing Conceptions of Marriage and
Divorce: Marriage as Fixed or Fluid? 209
Validity of Marriage 211
Procedural Aspects of Defining Valid Marriages 212
Divorce in Caste Laws 213
Economic Rights within Marriage and upon Divorce 216
Interactions between Diverse Societal Organizations and Actors 218
Contestations among Informal Legal Actors 218
Women’s Organizations as Informal Forums of
Justice: Implementing State Law without Litigation 220
Women’s Organization as Moral Watchdogs: Women’s
Organizations and Caste Authorities 221
Bargaining for Women’s Rights vis-à-vis the State and
the Caste 222
The Caste Panchayat among the Sai Suthars 224
Internal Governance of Family Matters among
the Sai Suthars 224
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CONTENTSxiv
The Gendered Sphere among the Sai Suthars 227
Fragmented Caste Panchayat and the Adjudication of
the Family within the Caste 229
The Caste Is the Public Sphere and the State Private 231
In the Shadow of State Law and Courts 232
Justice through “Other Means” 232
Women’s Experiences in State Courts 233
Dual Patriarchies of the Family and the State 234
Struggles for Legal Autonomy in Family Matters among
the Kutchi Visa Oswals (KVOs) 237
The KVOs and the History of Migration to Mumbai 238
Forming a Panchayat 239
Family, Capital, and Religio-Cultural Organization 242
Gendered Sphere within the Caste 244
Protecting the Good Woman: Denial of Divorce in the
Family Court 245
Rubber-Stamping Informal Settlements 247
Social Movement around Marriage and Divorce –
Reaction to State-Led Reforms 251
State-Society Encounters in Law: Comparison of
Caste-Based Legal Forums 252
Other Societal Legal Bodies: Women’s Organizations 254
Legal Actors in Society: Notaries, Lawyers, Middlemen 259
Leveraging Authority: Strongmen and Political Parties in
the Adjudication of Hindu Law in Society 261
Conclusion 265
5. Juristic Diversity, Contestations over “Islamic Law,” and Women’s Rights: Regulation of Matrimonial Matters in Muslim Personal Law 267
Introduction 267
The Nature of Muslim Personal Law and the Classification
of Legal Actors and Institutions in Societal Arena 268
Individual Legal Actors and “Private” Divorce 269
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CONTENTS xv
Interlawyer Negotiations 273
The Clergy 274
Strongmen 276
Organized Legal Bodies, Doorstep Courts, and Processes of
Adjudication 278
The Administration of Muslim Personal Law in the Dar
ul Qaza 278
Residential Committees 281
Civil Society and the Administration of Muslim
Personal Law 284
The Doorstep Courts 290
Dispute Resolution among Organized Sects: The Khojas 292
Sociopolitical Changes in the Community between the
1950s and the 1990s 295
Family Laws among the Ithana Ashari Khojas 296
Interaction with Other Forums 298
The Question of Representation: Who Represents the
Community? 300
Divergent Opinions on the Establishment of Religious
“Courts” 302
Conflict and Convergence between Statutory Muslim
Personal Law and Societal Laws 303
Agency and Its Constraints: Muslim Women’s Rights in the
Legally Plural Sphere 312
The Campaign around Nikahnama: Reforms from Within 316
Competing Ideologies and Interests among Socio-Legal
Actors and Institutions 320
Conclusion 323
6. Conclusion 325
What Factors Would Bring About a Change in This Model? 333
The Shared Adjudication Model Compared to Other
Proposals for Accommodating Communities and
Ensuring Gender Equality 335
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CONTENTSxvi
Discussing Law Reform in Personal Laws 343
Conclusion 346
Appendix 349
Bibliography 351
Index 387
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xvii
2.1. Dynamics of interaction: state laws and societal laws page 61
3.1. Comparison of percentages of cases filed under matrimonial remedies, cases filed under civil and criminal laws of maintenance for economic rights, and injunctions for suits 96
3.2. Number of cases filed and disposed (1990–1999) 98
3.3. The nature of disposal of cases in Family Court 100
Figures
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xix
3.1. Number of Cases Filed in the Family Court, Mumbai (1989–2001) page 95
3.2. Total Number of Cases Filed and Disposed in the Family Court, Mumbai (1990–2001) 97
3.3. Number of Litigants Interviewed 104
4.1. Accessing Diverse Adjudicative Forums under Hindu Law 177
Tables
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xxi
States and religious groups struggle to control the family in multireli-
gious and multiethnic societies, and as a result, these societies face the
challenge of constructing institutional arrangements that can facilitate
equality between diverse ethno-religious groups and ensure gender jus-
tice within these groups. Responding to this issue, many postcolonial
states have not enacted uniform civil laws to govern the family, but have
adopted legal pluralism and arrived at accommodative agreements with
religious groups in the regulation of the family. Scholars have argued
that these states’ recognition of religious family laws essentializes reli-
gious groups, fuels religious extremism, leads to interreligious conflict,
and prevents the construction of the political community. Feminists add
that states barter women’s rights to accommodate religious groups and
thus violate women’s human rights in the family.
Drawing on these debates, this book addresses the questions: How
do societies resolve the critical tension between cultural autonomy and
gender equality in contestations around family law? How do they design
group rights without cementing group boundaries? I turn to legal institu-
tional arrangements adopted by postcolonial states to answer this ques-
tion and study what I call the “shared adjudication model” adopted in
India. The Indian state recognizes religious laws of Hindus and Muslims,
and shares its adjudicative authority with internally heterogeneous reli-
gious communities and other societal sources in matters of marriage
and divorce. This study offers an ethnographic account of how religious
Preface
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PREFACExxii
family law is produced, interpreted, and adjudicated in state courts as
well as in multiple societal legal sites such as caste and sect councils, and
informal legal sites such as mosques, “doorstep law courts,” women’s
organizations, and lawyers’ offices in Mumbai.
The central claim in this book is that cultural pluralism in recognition
of religious family laws can facilitate gender equality in law and prevent
the ossification of religious identities. Retaining the analytical fiction
of demarcation between state and societal laws while focusing on state-
society negotiations over the meanings of these boundaries, I argue that
the Indian model creates an interpenetrative legal sphere governing the
family, which facilitates the paradoxical movement of centralization and
decentralization of law in which societal legal orders and actors infiltrate
the formal legal system while state law is carried into society by societal
legal agents, and thus, religious family law is generated in both the state
and societal arena by heterogeneous actors. As a result, among Hindus
and Muslims, plural legal actors imagine, construct, debate, shape, and
regulate heterogeneous notions and models of the family, marriage,
gender, and religion in state and societal legal sites. These ideologically
diverse actors and institutions interact with one another and transmit,
communicate, transform, or resist these plural versions of the family,
gender, and religion across legal spheres. These processes allow cross-
pollination of insights and enable the different meanings of Hinduness
and Muslimness, of religious identities and belonging, of conjugality and
cohabitation, of gender roles, and rights to flourish.
I contend that a plural legal system with shifting balance of author-
ity between the state, internally fragmented religious communities, civic
organizations, and women’s movement at times undermines the state
even as at other times it strengthens the state, and often checks viola-
tions of individual liberty. The book argues that the shared adjudication
model adopted by the Indian state facilitates diversity, as it allows the
construction of hybrid religious identities, fractures the “fixed” religious
identities, and provides institutional spaces for ongoing intersocietal dia-
log between ethno-religious groups, civil society, and the state.
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PREFACE xxiii
Gender equality in this model is complex, uneven, and negotiated –
an outcome of localized struggles between various actors and bodies,
requiring a bundle of strategies simultaneously. In this model, state-
led reforms from above travel into and cross-fertilize with society-led
reforms from below; doctrinal tensions and diverse interpretations of
religious texts (including feminist readings) coexist with contestations
around what constitutes customary law and traditions. Processes of pub-
lic reason and deliberation between various stakeholders over normative
value differences coexist with political negotiations, street action, and
campaigns for law reforms. Individual and collective agency of women,
despite its constraints, challenges, in millions of adjudicative sites, the
gender inequality grounded and institutionalized in state and socie-
tal legal systems through legal mobilization, and offers alternatives for
change, pushing for structural reforms from below.
These interactions between the lay, civic, and religious authorities
are grounded in certain specific sociocultural and political develop-
ments. The implicit consensus between a majority of political parties
over accommodation of group rights in the governance of the family,
internally fragmented community elite who have displayed flexibility in
discussing law reforms with the civil society and social movements, the
Indian Women’s Movement’s multipronged approaches to legal reforms,
active civic organizations, reformist judiciary, and the institutionaliza-
tion of bargaining and accommodation as state craft are some condi-
tions that underlie the shared adjudication model and enable structural
change. This book contends that cultural pluralism and gender equality
are not antithetical to one another, but can be harmonized, and the find-
ings here are of significance to ongoing discussions on law reform and
the designing of institutional arrangements in multicultural societies.
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xxv
This book emerged out of my doctoral thesis in the Department of
Political Science at McGill University in 2007, and I am grateful to a
wide range of people who have made it possible. Fieldwork for me was
the highlight of this endeavor – a productive, engaging phase – and I
am immensely grateful to respondents who shared their experiences and
stories. During the course of countless conversations, a broad range of
people engaged with my research and offered insights; familiarized me
with customs, laws, and procedures; invited me to celebrate rituals, fes-
tivals, and meetings; asked me about my politics and shared theirs; and
offered me hospitality. I am very grateful to women litigants who took
extra time from their packed daily routines to share their stories. In partic-
ular, I would like to thank various members and officials of the Meghwal
panchayat. Pushpaben Waghela, Lalitbhai Waghela, and Vishrambhai
Waghela accompanied me to interviews with various litigants, and I am
deeply grateful to them for sharing their insights into the workings of the
Meghwal panchayat. I also appreciate the help of Leeladharbhai Gadda,
Kanubhai Galia, Bipinbhai Gohil, Mohammadbhai Habibali, Shirish
Malde, Shirinben Maneckia, Iqbal Maniar, Harounbhai Musawala,
Sushilaben Shah, and Yasmin Sheikh. I also would like to thank Mr. S.G.
Tambe, Additional Registrar (Admin., Appellate Side) of the Bombay
High Court, for facilitating the permission to access court records.
I would like to acknowledge Pratibha Jagtap and Vandana Nanaware
of the Special Cell for Women, and to extend my thanks to Hasina Khan,
Acknowledgments
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTSxxvi
Naseem Sheikh, and Yasmin Sheikh from Awaz e Niswan for discussing
individual cases and letting me accompany them in their field visits. In
addition, I would like to acknowledge the struggles of many feminist
groups, including Mumbai-based groups like Awaz e Niswan, the Forum
Against Oppression of Women, Majlis, Stree Mukti Sanghatana, the
Women’s Centre, and the Women’s Research and Action Group toward
democratic, just, and equal families.
At McGill University, I owe first thanks to my advisor, Narendra
Subramanian, for his patience and constructive comments. I am espe-
cially indebted to Alan Patten for his mentoring in the early stages of the
doctoral program and for his consistent support. My reading course with
Alan was instrumental in building the theoretical foundations of this
project. Thanks are also due to Juliet Johnson and Hudson Meadwell
for their support during key moments, and to my doctoral committee
members, Jacob Levy and Khalid Medani, for their instructive ques-
tions. Rachel Sturman has been an important interlocutor and I am
deeply grateful to her, to the anonymous reviewers, and the law and
society series editors at Cambridge University Press for their invalu-
able advice, comments, and suggestions. More recently, at Carleton
University, I would like to thank my colleagues, Vandna Bhatia, Chris
Gabriel, Randall Germain, Radha Jhappan, and Laura Macdonald, for
their supportive collegiality, and Nabarun Roy and Michael Spacek for
research assistance. Many findings of this study were shared at various
conferences, and I have benefited immensely from encouragement and
the suggestions of Itty Abraham, Tani Barlow, Amrita Basu, Srimati
Basu, Durba Ghosh, and Sylvia Vatuk. I would especially like to thank
my editor at Cambridge University Press, John Berger, for believing in
this project from the very beginning and for his quiet encouragement
throughout the process.
Friends in Canada, India, and elsewhere have been invaluable in
this pursuit. I have leaned on Giselle Amantea, Dolores Chew, Nimisha
Dalal, Debjani Das, Arnika Fuhrmann, Geetanjali Gangoli, Sandhya
Gokhale, Ramlath Kavil, Mrityunjoy Mohanty, Shree Mulay, Sandra
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xxvii
Robinson, Evelyn Rodinos, Takeshi Sato, Fatima Seedat, Chayanika
Shah, Daya Varma, and Peter White for their generosity and understand-
ing. I would also like to thank Nasreen Chowdhory, Mustapha Ettobi,
Prashant Keshavmurthy, and Spyro Kotsovilis for their warm solidarity;
Manal Jamal for her stories and laughter; and Suranjan Weeraratne for
many stimulating conversations.
My family has been a source of strength in every way. My brother
Chetan Solanki kept me grounded with his love, empathy, and wit.
Without him, it would have been impossible to finish this project. I would
like to thank C.S. Mehta, Nandini and Dhiru Mehta, Shweta Patel,
and Ashoka Valia for their support. I am grateful to Jethabhai Valia,
Jyotsna and Harshad Valia, and Mohan Valia for their strength, care,
and wisdom. Most of all, I would like to acknowledge my grandfather,
Keshubhai Valia, whose work with vulnerable members of the society,
including women, has inspired me. He cofounded and nurtured one of
the first women’s organizations in Saurashtra, and the central concerns of
this book have been influenced by the numerous stories of women I have
heard over the years. Similarly, I owe a deep personal debt to my grand-
mother, Ramaben, and to my mother, whose academic interests and sup-
port of women’s rights have shaped my politics and research agendas over
the years. This book is dedicated to my mother, Asha Valia, and to my
grandparents, Ramaben Valia and Keshubhai Valia, for it all began with
them and without them, this project would never have materialized.
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xxix
AIMPLB All Indian Muslim Personal Law Board
BJP Bhartiya Janata Party
BMC Bombay Municipal Corporation (currently
Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai)
CPI (M) Communist Party of India (Marxist)
CrPC Criminal Procedure Code
HAMA Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act 1956
HMA Hindu Marriage Act 1955
IPC Indian Penal Code
IWM Indian Women’s Movement
MWA Muslim Women’s (Protection of Rights on Divorce)
Act 1986
OBC Other Backward Classes
SC Supreme Court
SP Samajwadi Party
UCC Uniform Civil Code
Abbreviations
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Adivasi Generic term to describe a tribes-person
Asmita Dignity
Barots Clan genealogists and poets
Bhailog Local mafia
Burqa Veil
Chamar/Chamhar The name of an oppressed caste
Chawl A residential building that is structured like
barracks; each family has a room, but they
share toilet facilities with others
Chhappaniyo dukal The famine of 1856
Chowky Beat office of the local police station
Dada Strongman
Dargah The site of the Muslim shrine
Dashavatar The story of the ten reincarnations of the
Hindu god Vishnu
Dher Literally, animals. Derogatory name for an
oppressed caste
Faisla Decision
Faskh Judicial dissolution of marriage for causes
stipulated in Islamic law
Glossary
The technical legal terms, especially in Islamic law, used here reflect their local usage in Urdu, Hindi, and/or local languages, and are not an exact transliteration from Arabic or Persian.
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GLOSSARYxxxii
Fatwa Legal opinion
Fiqh The product of human understanding that sought
to interpret and implement the Sharia
Ghar-gharna Second marriage that is not ritualistically
celebrated in public
Gharsansar Domestic matters
Gnati Caste
Hadith Commentaries on the Quran
Holi Spring festival
Homa Invocation before the sacred fire
Iddat A period of three months and ten days
Ijtihad Interpretive science of juridical reasoning
Imambara A locality in central Mumbai with a high
concentration of Muslim families
Jamaat Assembly, collective
Jamaatkhana A council hall of the community
Kamadiya Accountant
Khula A form of divorce initiated by the wife
Khum One-fifth of the savings of every individual
Lakh One hundred thousand
Lok Adalat People’s court
Lok Sabha The lower house of parliament
Madhabib Classical schools of law
Mahar The name of an oppressed caste
Mahila Aghadi The women’s wing of Shiv Sena, the Hindu right
wing party
Mahila Mandal A women’s group
Mangalsutra A necklace made of black beads worn by married
Hindu women in India
Masjid Mosque
Mehar Dower
Melawala A social gathering
Mohalla Residential area
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GLOSSARY xxxiii
Mufti Juriconsultant
Mukhi Treasurer
Mulla Religious teacher or leader
Muta Temporary marriages contracted under the Shia
law. This marriage does not create the right of
inheritance between the husband and wife, but
the children are legitimate and could inherit from
both parents
Nats Acrobats
Nawab An aristocrat
Nikah Marriage
Nikahnama A marriage contract
Nyay Panchayat Forum for justice
Panch A group of five elders of the community
Panchayati Raj Decentralized governance
Pateliyas Middlemen
Pir Sufi preceptor
Pooja Prayer
Pucca Made of cement
Qazi Judge, officiating officer representing religious
authority
Saakh Social prestige
Samaj Collective
Sanskar Culture
Sapinda Nearest heir or blood relative, connected by ties
of consanguinity
Saptapadi A ceremony in Hindu marriage that involves
walking seven steps around the sacred fire
Sharia The divine law
Shehnai A traditional wind instrument made of metal
Sodchithi Customary divorce
Stridhan Gifts given to a married woman at the time of her
marriage or during the course of her marriage
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GLOSSARYxxxiv
Sunna The Prophet’s deeds and teachings
Talaq Divorce
Talaq ahasan A single pronouncement of divorce made during a
period of menstruation followed by sexual
abstinence during iddat
Talaq e tafwid Delegated divorce
Talaq hasan Three pronouncements made during successive
tuhrs during which time no sexual relations take
place
Talaqnama Deed of divorce
Talaq ul bidaat Three pronouncements made during a single tuhr
in one sentence or a single pronouncement made
during a tuhr clearly indicating an intention to
dissolve the marriage irrevocably
Tuhr The period between menstrual cycles
Turis Shehnai players
Vanakars Weavers
Varghoda The groom’s party
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