Amid allegations about a concerted effort to complicate the issue of conversion of Hindu woman Akhila (alias Hadia) to Islam and her marriage with a Muslim youth, which a large section of the Kerala society is viewing as a typical case of love jehad, the State Women’s Commission has decided to seek the Supreme Court’s permission to meet her and her family.
The commission is approaching the apex court, which had on August 16 asked the NIA to look into the entire affair relating to conversion of Akhila (25), for permission to meet her for preparing a factual report on her condition in the context of complaints that she has been facing denial of basic rights at her parent’s house, where she is staying currently as per a court order.
The women’s panel had received several complaints and memorandums in this regard and its Chairperson MC Josephine informed that the panel was interfering in the issue in order to avoid deterioration in the social situation. A decision in this regard was taken on the basis of legal advices from the Advocate General and the commission’s own standing counsel.
“As the issue is under the court’s consideration, we need its permission to meet the girl. Therefore we decided to seek its permission on the basis of legal advice,” Josephine said on Sunday. Writer J Devika ridiculed this claim by asking whether representatives of the State Government needed such permissions to meet a girl like Akhila/Hadia.
The commission’s objective is to prepare a factual report on the condition of Akhila/Hadia by directly meeting her and her parents, who have been entrusted with her custody as per a May 25 order of the Kerala High Court, at their house at TV Puram, Vaikom in Kottayam district. The panel said that making pro-women interventions in social issues was part of its duties.
The High Court had handed over Akhila/Hadia’s custody to her father Asokan by annulling her marriage with Muslim youth Shaffin Jahan (27) on December 19 last year. Akhila had embraced Islam and had assumed the Muslim name Hadia when she was studying homeopathic medicine in Tamil Nadu in 2015.
Representatives of a women’s collective who had made an unsuccessful bid on August 30 to meet Akhila/Hadia at her parents’ house in Vaikom had the other day alleged that she was literally under house arrest. They had reported that she had cried out to them from the house’s window that she was being tortured and wanted to be saved from there.
The panel’s move has come at a time when allegations are rife that a concerted campaign is on to derail the NIA probe ordered by the Supreme Court into the issue. There were allegations that an Islamist organization was behind her conversion and also that there was a conspiracy to enroll Akhila/Hadia with the Islamic State (ISIS) and to take her to Syria.
A section in the Kerala society believes that the Akhila/Hadia case is not an isolated one and that such cases are examples of love Jehad, a programme certain Islamists have devised to lure non-Muslim girls into Islam through conversion and marriage. However, the Kerala Police have consistently denied the existence of any such programme.
The Kerala State Human Rights Commission is scheduled to take up on October 3 a complaint that Akhila/Hadia has been kept under virtual house arrest at her parents’ place. It has already sought explanation from the woman’s father Asokan on the basis of a complaint lodged by Munavvarali Shihab Thangal, president of the Muslim Youth league.
Rights commission member K Mohankumar had observed that it was a serious matter if her parents had been deliberately violating her basic rights on the pretext of the High Court order and that a detailed inquiry was required in the matter. Jahan has already approached the Supreme Court seeking revocation of the NIA probe.