Guwahati, Feb 28: Assam Congress leader Debabrata Saikia on Wednesday slammed the Assam Cabinet’s recent decision to repeal the Assam Muslim Marriage and Divorce Registration Act, 1935, stating that the claims made to back the decision were “untrue”.
Reiterating that the Cabinet decision was taken to primarily make way for the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the state, Saikia said that the decision to scrap the Act was taken in a hasty manner, without consultation or going through the Act and its amendments.
“The reason cited for the Cabinet decision is that the Assam Muslim Marriage and Divorce Registration Act, 1935 is an obsolete Act, enacted during the British regime. Secondly, it was stated that there was no mandatory provision for registration of marriage and registration of divorce. Besides, it was also stated there was neither accountability nor record of persons below 18 years in case of female, and below 21 years of age in case of male, are being married,” the Congress leader said.
“However, the claim that the Act had become obsolete is untrue as the Congress government had made amendments to the Act and reintroduced it as the Assam Muslim Marriage and Registration Act, 2010,” he said.
“A notification was issued by the legislative department, Assam government, making the Assam Muslim Marriage & Registration Act 2010, by which Muslim marriages and divorces were made compulsory within the state of Assam,” said Saikia.
Saikia further termed the Assam Cabinet’s claim that there was no proper verification of age of the bride and groom under the Act as untrue.
“The qazis were required to provide a monthly report of marriages and divorces to the government with age verification documents,” he said.
Notably, Opposition parties had, in the wake of the state Cabinet’s decision to repeal the Act, accused the BJP of attempting to polarise the state ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
