The Allahabad High Court (AHC) has ruled that conversion done "with the sole purpose of marriage is not valid,” reports The Indian Express (IE) of December 19, 2014. Five couples hailing from various towns in Uttar Pradesh had approached the court alleging harassment by relatives and the police following their marriage and conversion of the women from Hinduism to Islam.
Justice Surya Prakash Kesarwani said that the conversion of a person "without any real belief in the religion to which he/she is converting, was null and void.” Such a marriage was against the tenets of the Quran and also the rulings of the Supreme Court on the issue, the IE report mentions.
While dismissing the couples’ pleas, the court said, "The alleged conversion of petitioner No. 1 (girls) in each of the writ petitions cannot be said to be bona fide or valid. The religion of petitioner was converted (changed) at the instance of petitioner No. 2 (boys) to marry with the girl. The petitioner girls have stated that they do not know about Islam,” the IE report states.
"In the writ petitions, as well as in the statements on oath made before this court, the petitioner girls have not stated that they have any real faith and belief in the unity of God and Mohammed to be prophet. They all stated that the boy got their religion converted (changed) with sole purpose to marry with her,” notes the newspaper.
"Concluding that these marriages were ‘against the mandate of… the Holy Quran,’ the court said: ‘Thus conversion (change) of religion to Islam… without their faith and belief in Islam and at the instances of the boys, solely for the purpose of marriage, cannot be said to be a valid conversion to the Islam religion.’
"The petitioners (girls), most of whom were aged around 18 or 19, had earlier submitted before the court that they ‘did not know anything about Islam; they were not in the room when their religion was converted (changed); and that they converted only because the boys wanted them to.’
"The boys had also submitted before the court that they were not aware of the paperwork regarding conversion. But they did admit that they had got the women converted for the sake of marriage,” mentions IE.
In the case of Goolrookh Gupta versus the Valsad Parsi Anjuman, two justices from a three-member division bench of the Gujarat High Court claimed that under the Special Marriage Act a woman took on her husband’s religion. This ruling is being challenged before the Supreme Court. The Anjuman had claimed Gupta had converted to Hinduism, an allegation she vehemently denied. But even if a Hindu marriage ceremony was performed prior to or after a civil marriage to assuage sentiments of the concerned families, the AHC ruling indicates no conversion would be said to have taken place. Similarly, when interfaith couples have the Parsi marriage ceremony performed, the non-Parsi spouse would not have been said to be converted to Zoroastrianism.