Re: Womens right to divorce, given by her husband
A large number of nikkah namas (forms declaring a man and woman husband and wife) prepared in Karachi at least if not the rest of the country are incomplete because seven out of 28 paragraphs are excluded, Daily Times has learnt.
The omitted paragraphs run from Nos. 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 and 28 and pertain to the woman’s rights in a marriage.
Paragraph** No. 16 deals with Haq Mehr**, or the amount of money that a husband is required, by the Shariah and Pakistani law, to pay his wife if their marriage ends. Any other property given instead by the woman or man must be declared on the forms.
Paragraph No. 17 says that any special terms and conditions that the woman or the man puts forward should be mentioned independently.
Paragraph No. 18 details the basis on which the man has allowed his** wife to demand a divorce from him**. These sections are, however, usually crossed out by clerics or nikkah khwans, which means that in these cases the woman is not given her right to demand divorce or to declare it herself.
Nearly 25% of the Nikah Nama is missing. This is unbelievable! Clearly such changes are not officially sanctioned by the state but there are severe problems implementing the state’s writ. Marriage registrars have considerable freedom, it seems, when it comes to this business:
The authorities have taken a stab at tackling this problem but it appears not to be high priority. The city government has formed Maslihati Anjuman and Insaaf Committees at the Union Council and town levels. It is said in Paragraph No. 21 that if a man is already married then he needs a certificate from the Maslihati Anjuman but the city government keeps manual records instead of computerised ones which makes the process of checking next to impossible.
Assuming that this is being done intentionally by selected Khateebs, I consider it a criminal act on their part. The official Nikah Nama is being modified by the Imams/Moulvis/Khateebs/Registrars without the permission of the marrying couple, and important provisions that protect the wife are selectively being removed without informing the couple. Add to this the fact that quite often these Nikah Namas are not read in that much detail, and in the absence of full information, brides usually don’t even know what might be missing. One does not have to search hard to find cases where at least one member of a family has suffered because they were not told about, and not given their full due rights in marriage.
While clearly something must be done about this selective changes in the Nikah Nama, we also need education in the society regarding the meaning of a Nikah, the rights and privileges accorded in such and agreement, and how the laws of Pakistani are technically setup to protect those provisions. In the meantime, do check what your own Nikah Nama says…