GUWAHATI: The Madras High Court recently ruled that compelling or attempting to convert a spouse to another religion without their consent constitutes violence and mental cruelty.
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This verdict was delivered by a Bench of Justices N Seshasayee (now retired) and L Victoria Gowri of the Madurai Bench, while hearing an appeal by a Muslim man challenging the dissolution of his marriage with a Hindu woman.
The couple had married under the Special Marriage Act. However, the wife later sought divorce, alleging mental and physical abuse, cruelty, and desertion. She also accused her husband of taunting her over her religion and caste and pressuring her to convert to Islam.
Following the situation, a trial court had granted her divorce, which the husband challenged in the High Court. However, the latter upheld the trial court’s decision, stating that forcing or attempting to convert a spouse amounts to a violation of their fundamental right to life and liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution.
It further observed that such actions breach the right to freedom of religion under Article 25. “A matrimony, which commenced with love and affection, but struggles due to a husband’s attitude of compelling his wife to convert to Islam, renaming her, and forcing her to abandon her beliefs, would amount to abject cruelty,” the court said in its ruling. “Forcible conversion means violence.”
The bench also emphasised the expectations in love marriages, noting that a spouse enters such a union with the hope that their personal space, beliefs, and traditions will be respected. It further held that since the husband had been staying with his sister for several years, he had also deserted his wife.
Citing mental agony suffered by the wife, the court ruled that the case warranted divorce on grounds of cruelty and desertion. It concluded that not just conversion, but even the effort to proselytise a spouse without consent amounts to absolute violence.