Apex court provides relief to unwed mothers
The Supreme Court needs to be profusely complimented for its landmark verdict holding an unwed mother as the sole guardian of her minor children. There have been many instances where the biological father has played the deserter, leaving the woman to bring up a child out of the relationship. And yet, on issues of parenthood, such as while filling up admission forms for schools or for a passport, the man's consent is needed to be identified as the father of the child. In other words, the father continued to be one of the guardians legally — the sole guardian even.
This, therefore, provided an occasion for the errant father to harass the deserted mother and the child, by imposing conditions. This was patently unfair to the woman. A two-judge bench of the apex court rightly observed that “in situations where the father has not exhibited any concern for his offspring, giving him legal recognition would be an exercise in futility”. The judgement is a tribute to the women of today who are increasingly striking out on their own under adverse circumstances, becoming financially independent and willing to take decisions that were considered the preserve of men. Even so, there is a lot that needs to be done, and women have still to tread cautiously.
This is evident in the proceedings of the case at hand, where the woman who approached the court preferred anonymity — she is referred to in court records as “ABC”. The court identified her as “well-educated, gainfully employed and financially secure”. The Supreme Court took both the legal and the humanitarian aspects into account in holding an unwed mother the sole guardian of her child, when it said that the petitioner could apply for guardianship without disclosing the name of the biological father.
The social import of the verdict is not lost either. Unwed mothers, whether educated or not, whether financially secure or not, have to battle a stigma that is not of their making. First, they suffer the trauma of desertion by a man whose child they bear, and then they have to constantly face the emotional stress of hearing disdainful and often humiliating voices from society. In most parts of rural India, where women empowerment is at its lowest, an unwed mother is considered a taint on her family and the society she lives in. The innocent child too often becomes the target of malicious talk and even torture in households. Monday's court verdict will not instantly change the ground situation, but it does at least offer some dignity to the unwed mother.
The apex court's decision came after it set aside the verdicts of a lower court and the Delhi High Court, which had upheld the provisions of the Guardians and Wards Act, 1890, requiring the unwed mother to disclose the father's name and seek his consent for guardianship even if he were not involved in raising the child. The petitioner, “ABC”, then came to the Supreme Court with her grievance. With the Monday judgement, there is now scope for a re-interpretation of the term ‘parent', as enunciated in Section 11 of the Act. The verdict is a reminder to our lawmakers to move swiftly to amend or scrap laws that have either outlived their purpose or are blatantly discriminatory in nature. It is shocking that such laws should continue to determine the fate of millions of Indians.