India: A Secular Republic ? A state Govt is Probing Inter-Religious Marriages

Probe into Maharashtra's Muslim boy-Hindu girl marriages

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4731303.cms

3 Jul 2009, 0511 hrs IST, Sanjeev Shivadekar, TNN

MUMBAI: Maharashtra’s criminal investigation department (CID) meant to probe high-profile cases will now investigate love affairs that have resulted in marriages between Hindu girls and Muslim boys.

CID has been told to check whether Muslim boys are enticing Hindu girls as part of a ‘conspiracy’. Minister of state for home (rural) Nitin Raut had announced this in the assembly on the last day of Maharashtra’s budget session a fortnight back.

Participating in a calling attention notice, Eknath Khadse and Devendra Fadnavis had said young Muslim boys in rural areas were wooing Hindu college girls and then marrying them. According to them, this was part of a ‘conspiracy’ to increase the population of the community. Khadse even alleged that some Hindu girls had been sent to Gulf.

In his reply, Raut admitted such incidents were happening. ‘‘I will initiate an inquiry into this,’’ the minister had promised. But the opposition demanded that he order a CID probe as the issue was serious. Subsequently, Raut gave in to their demands.

CID chief SPS Yadav said, ‘‘We have yet to receive the order. The first thing we will have to do is to check whether such an inquiry is in consonance with the CID manual. If not, we will inform the government about the norms,’’ he said. ‘‘If government persists, we will decide on how to carry out these investigations.’’

Raut’s announcement has not gone down well with his cabinet colleagues and leaders of the Muslim community. Senior NCP leader and labour minister Nawab Malik said BJP has political interest in raising such issues.

Congress leader and minister of state for home (urban) Arif Naseem Khan said there is no provision in law where member of a particular community can be stopped from marrying a girl\boy of another community. ‘‘If any case where a girl\boy is pressurised into getting married to member of other community, the offender should be certainly punished,’’ he added.

Refuting the allegations made by Malik and Khan, Fadnavis said, ‘‘Had we wanted to politicise the issue, we would have carried out morcha and protest, instead we demanded CID inquiry that shows that our intention was not to gain political mileage of the issue.’’