Opposition demands referring triple talaq bill to joint select committee
New Delhi, Dec 27 : A united opposition in the Lok Sabha Thursday pitched for referring the triple talaq bill to a 'joint select committee' of Parliament, claiming its provisions were unconstitutional and that there was a need for a greater scrutiny of the draft law.
As soon as the House met at 2 pm after an adjournment to take up the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, Congress Leader in the Lok Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, demanded it be referred to a joint select committee of both Houses for greater scrutiny.
He said several provisions of the bill were "unconstitutional".
AIADMK leader P Venugopal, TMC's Sudip Bandhopadhyay, AIMIM's Assaduddin Owaisi and Supriya Sule (NCP) also made similar demands.
Speaker Sumitra Mahajan said a similar bill was discussed and passed by the Lok Sabha and therefore members can flag issues during the debate.
She said all of a sudden a demand cannot be made to send it to a committee.
Speaking in the house before moving the resolution, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said the triple talaq bill, which seeks imprisonment for Muslim men accused of instant divorce, is not about politics but empowerment and justice for women.
Responding to demand of opposition parties, including the Congress and the Trinamool Congress, that the bill be sent to a select committee for study, Prasad said the government has already taken note of concerns expressed by members earlier and amended the bill accordingly.
Prasad told the Lok Sabha that the bill has made the offence compoundable, meaning that the case can be withdrawn if the man and his estranged wife reach a compromise, and that only the wife and her close relatives can file an FIR, ruling out the law's misuse.
"Don't weigh the bill on the scales of politics. This bill is not about any specific religion and community. The bill is about humanity and justice," he said, urging lawmakers of different parties to speak in one voice to support the legislation.
He said as many as 477 cases of triple talaq have been reported since January 2017 and cited a case where a professor gave talaq to his wife over Whatsapp.
Whereas another muslim man gave talaq to his wife for attending the Prime Minister Narendra Modi's rally, the Union Law minister said, urging if the house unitedly can pass a bill for capital punishment for alleged rape with girls below age of 12 years, then why not this legislation.
Moving his statutory resolution opposing an ordinance issued earlier (which the bill seeks to replace), N K Premchandran (Revolutionary Socialist Party) said the bill is bad in law as it seeks to criminalise a "civil wrong" and hence it should be referred to a select committee.
Opposing the Triple talaq bill in its current form, Congress MP Sushmita Dev Thursday said in the real purpose of the bill was not to empower Muslim women but to "penalise" Muslim men.
Demanding that the bill be referred to the joint select committee of Parliament, Dev said criminalisation of triple talaq goes against the Supreme Court verdict.
"In the name of empowerment you (the government) have given nothing but a criminal case to women...the aim of the bill is not to empower Muslim women but to penalise Muslim men," she said.
The fresh Bill to make the practice of triple talaq among Muslims a penal offence was introduced in the Lok Sabha on December 17 to replace an ordinance issued in September.
Under the proposed law, giving instant triple talaq will be illegal and void, and will attract a jail term of three years for the husband. The fresh bill will supersede an earlier bill passed in the Lok Sabha and pending in the Rajya Sabha.
The earlier bill was approved by the Lower House.
But amid opposition by some parties in the upper house, the government had then cleared some amendments, including introduction of a provision of bail, to make it more acceptable.
However, as the bill continued to face resistance in the Rajya Sabha, the government issued an ordinance in September, incorporating the amendments.
An ordinance has a life of six months. But from the day a session begins, it has to be replaced by a bill which should be passed by Parliament within 42 days (six weeks), else it lapses.
The government is at liberty to re-promulgate the ordinance if the bill fails to get through Parliament.
Citing details of instant triple talaq cases, the government had last week informed the Lok Sabha that till now 430 incidents of triple talaq have come to the notice of the government through the media.
Of these, 229 were reported before the Supreme Court declared triple talaq as unconstitutional, while another 201 came to the notice after it.
These cases were reported between the period January 2017 and September 13, 2018. Four hours have been allocated to discuss the bill.
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Kerala court sentences man to life imprisonment for doc's murder in hospital
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Kollam (PTI): A teacher convicted in the sensational murder of Dr Vandana Das inside a hospital here was sentenced to life term on Saturday, and the prosecution said it will move an appeal seeking death penalty for the accused. The victim's family also batted for "maximum punishment".
Dr Das was brutally killed inside a taluk hospital in May 2023 by G Sandeep.
Kollam Additional District and Sessions judge P N Vinod sentenced Sandeep to a total of 30 years for various offences under the then Indian Penal Code (IPC) and said that after he serves that period, his life imprisonment for Das' murder will commence.
The court also imposed a fine of Rs 2.35 lakh on the convict.
Though the prosecution had sought death penalty for the accused during the arguments on sentence, the court was of the view that the case does not fall under the rarest-of-rare category to warrant the maximum punishment.
It was also of the view that there was a chance of the convict getting reformed as he told the court that the rest of his life would be one of repentance, the order on sentence said.
"At the same time, I agree with the stand of the prosecution to the effect that the sentence should commensurate with the gravity of the crime and the sentence should not only be reformative, but should also have a deterrent effect."
"In my view, the said objective can be achieved by directing that the term sentences that will be imposed will run consecutively and life sentence that has to be imposed will commence only after the expiration of terms sentences," the judge said.
After the verdict, special public prosecutor (SPP) Prathap G Padickal told reporters outside the court that he will recommend to the prosecution to file an appeal seeking enhancement of the life imprisonment to death penalty.
The victim's father said that the verdict has come as a relief for the family, but that he cannot authoritatively say whether his late daughter has got justice. He indicated his dissatisfaction with the punishment, saying that steps will be taken to seek its enhancement after discussions with the public prosecutor.
Dr Das' mother said that the family can only wish for the maximum punishment and it was up to the court to decide what sentence should be given. She said that the family will go in appeal, but declined to comment on whether her daughter got justice.
She tearfully said that she wants the convict to suffer the same pain that her daughter underwent "as he stabbed her 27 times".
The court on March 17 had convicted Sandeep for various offences under the IPC, including murder, destruction of evidence and wrongful restraint.
It had also held him guilty under the provisions of the Kerala Healthcare Service Persons and Healthcare Service Institutions (Prevention of violence and damage to property) Act 2012.
Sandeep was brought to the taluk hospital by the police for medical treatment during the small hours of May 10, 2023 and he went on a sudden attacking spree using a pair of surgical scissors kept in the room where his leg injury was being dressed.
A school teacher by profession, he had initially attacked the police officers and another person who had accompanied him to the hospital and then turned on the young Dr Das, who could not escape to safety.
She was stabbed several times and later succumbed to her injuries in a private hospital in Thiruvananthapuram where she was rushed following the attack.
Dr Das was a native of the Kaduthuruthy area of Kottayam district and the only child of her parents.
She was a house surgeon at Azeezia Medical College Hospital and was working at the Kottarakkara taluk hospital as part of her training.
Sandeep had called the emergency number 112, claiming that his life was in danger. When local police located him, he was standing close by his home, surrounded by local residents and his relatives, and had a wound on his leg following an alleged quarrel.
He was then taken to the hospital for dressing the wound.
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