Indian Supreme Court Allows Rape Survivor to Terminate Pregnancy, Says Conception Outside Marriage Injurious
New Age
Islam News Bureau
19 Aug 2023
·
Indian Supreme Court Allows
Rape Survivor to Terminate Pregnancy, Says Conception Outside Marriage
Injurious
·
Afghan Women Cannot Join
Husbands in UK As They Cannot Speak English
·
Trieste Women Bathe Clothed in
Solidarity with Muslim Women at Gender-Divided Beach
·
Women Bear the Brunt of
Taliban’s Gender Apartheid
·
A Woman Can Live, Fight and
Progress Without a Man: President Droupadi Murmu
·
Uttar Pradesh Muslim Couple
Killed After Son Elopes with Hindu Woman-----
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/indian-supreme-court-rape-pregnancy/d/130491
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Indian Supreme Court Allows Rape
Survivor to Terminate Pregnancy, Says Conception Outside Marriage Injurious
Photo: Law Trend
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PTI
New Delhi- 21.08.23
Observing that pregnancy outside
marriage is injurious and a cause of stress, the Supreme Court on Monday
allowed a rape survivor to undergo medical termination of her over 27-week
pregnancy.
Taking note of the survivor's medical
report, a bench of Justices B V Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan said the Gujarat
High Court was not right in rejecting the prayer for termination of pregnancy.
The top court said in Indian society
within the institution of marriage, pregnancy is a reason for joy and
celebration not only for the couple but for the family and friends.
"In contrast, pregnancy outside
marriage is injurious, particularly in cases of sexual assault or abuse and is
a cause of stress and trauma affecting the physical and mental health of
pregnant women. Sexual assault of a woman is itself distressing and sexual
abuse resulting in pregnancy compounds the injury. This is because such a
pregnancy is not voluntary or mindful."
"In view of the above discussion
and the medical report, we permit the appellant to terminate her pregnancy. We
direct her to be present in hospital tomorrow so that procedure for termination
of pregnancy can be carried out," the bench said.
The apex court said if the foetus is
found to be alive, the hospital shall give all necessary assistance, including
incubation to ensure the foetus survives.
If it survives, the State shall take
steps to ensure the child is adopted in accordance with the law, it said.
In a special sitting, the top court on
Saturday expressed displeasure over the Gujarat High Court adjourning the
survivor's plea for medical termination of her pregnancy, and said
"valuable time" has been lost during the pendency of the matter.
Under the Medical Termination of
Pregnancy (MTP) Act, the upper limit for the termination of pregnancy is 24
weeks for married women, special categories including survivors of rape and
other vulnerable women such as the differently-abled and minors.
Source: telegraphindia.com
https://www.telegraphindia.com/india/supreme-court-allows-rape-survivor-to-terminate-pregnancy-says-conception-outside-marriage-injurious/cid/1960480
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Afghan Women Cannot Join Husbands in UK As
They Cannot Speak English
A lack of
proficiency in English is stopping numerous women trapped in Afghanistan from
being reunited with their husbands in the UK. (AFP/File Photo)
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21 Aug 2023
Afghan women stuck under Taliban rule
are being barred from reuniting with their British husbands because they cannot
meet the English language standards needed to come to the UK.
MPs have warned Afghan women face huge
language barriers trying to get to Britain due to “bureaucratic” Home Office
rules requiring them to prove a certain level of English.
Wives can apply for an exemption to the
language requirements, but these are not easy to obtain. In Afghanistan, the
Taliban has banned women’s education, meaning most cannot learn a language.
They are also prohibited from travelling outside without a man.
English language test centres shut
Meanwhile, all English language test
centres in Afghanistan have closed, meaning Afghan women would only be able to
do the test if they are in a neighbouring country, like Pakistan. In one case,
a woman was denied a visa to travel to Pakistan – leaving her in an impossible
situation.
There is no English language requirement
for Ukrainian refugees who have come to the UK in their thousands and no
equivalent requirement for family members or wives of Afghans who have been
accepted into the UK under the government’s two main resettlement schemes, ACRS
and Arap.
One MP said the women had “bureaucratic
block after bureaucratic block put between them and reaching safety with their
families”. Another said the “cruel and callous inflexibility” of language
requirements was “putting vulnerable refugees in danger and tearing families
apart”.
afghan women 1 People protest in
Parliament Square at the anniversary of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.
In one case, a British-Afghan man has
been unable to secure a visa for his wife and one-year-old daughter, who are
stuck in Afghanistan, to travel to Pakistan to complete biometric tests
necessary for the spousal visa.
Prior to the Taliban takeover, the wife
had been studying English and had taken the required test and failed. She has
been unable to continue her education under the new regime. Attempts by the
husband to teach his wife English over the phone have also failed as the
internet connection is too bad, he told The Independent.
'Dangerous to be in Afghanistan'
The man, who was visiting his family in
Afghanistan when the Taliban took over the country in August 2021, accused the
government of “playing a game” with his family, adding: “I can’t see my baby. I
have paid around £7,000-8,000 in Home Office and solicitor’s fees. A decision
needs to be taken, because if something happens to my wife, who is going to be
responsible?”
In another case, a British-Afghan father
has been unable to find lawyers to help him apply for an exemption and is
concerned by government guidance that says his wife must meet certain English
requirements.
Hewaad Farhad said he was despairing at
his situation and did not know how to get a spousal visa for his wife because
she cannot speak English.
Farhad, who lives in former Prime
Minister Boris Johnson’s former constituency in Uxbridge, said: “I grew up in
the UK, my life – everything – is according to UK society. In Afghanistan, I
don’t have anything. I can’t work and it is dangerous being a British person
living in Afghanistan.”
Since the Taliban takeover, his wife
can’t get access to any teaching and is not allowed outside without a male
companion. Her brother tried to start teaching her some English, Mr Farhad
said, but she has not been able to make progress as she cannot read and write.
'We are scared we will land in trouble'
“There are no English classes and no
education for women,” he said. “She hasn’t been to school and when she grew up
she was living in a village far away from school and her father did not want
her to go.”
Speaking through a translator, his wife,
who is not being named for safety reasons, said: “It is very stressful here, it
is very depressing living with just the kids. The kids and myself miss him so
much.
“We are scared that we are going to get
into trouble and I’m not safe here. Learning English is very difficult and
challenging for me. Whatever it takes for me to get to the UK I want to do it.”
Caroline Lucas MP, who has constituents
with wives and children stuck in Afghanistan, has written to immigration
minister Robert Jenrick to ask for a review of decisions made on Afghanistan
visas.
In one of her constituents’ cases, a
British father’s wife and young children fled to a third country following the
Taliban takeover. The wife does not speak English and is unable to learn in the
country she is in as she is illiterate and needs to take care of her children.
The Home Office initially refused her
spousal visa application, saying she had not met the English language
requirement. But the decision was overturned after Ms Lucas’s intervention.
Tearing families apart
Ms Lucas said: “The Home Office’s cruel
and callous inflexibility on English language requirements is putting
vulnerable refugees in danger and tearing families apart. I have constituents
with spouses and children stranded in Afghanistan, who are at risk from the
Taliban, have had no formal education so face enormous language barriers, and
have no support network.
“These exceptional circumstances cannot
be met with an obstinate and uncaring bureaucracy.”
Tan Dhesi, Labour MP for Slough, has
also been approached by constituents unable to reunite with their families.
He said the government’s record on
supporting applicants in Afghanistan “has been abysmal”. He added: “Both the
Arap scheme and the ACRS have been beset with persistent failures from the start,
leaving many in fear for their lives in Afghanistan.
“Since the Taliban’s takeover, I have
been approached by numerous Slough constituents in need, including those who
simply want to reunite their families and ensure their safety. The government
must address these serious concerns in this delicate and grave situation.”
'Bureaucratic block after bureaucratic
block'
The chair of the all-party parliamentary
group for Afghan women and girls, Wendy Chamberlain MP, said: “Afghan women
were promised support by the government when the Taliban seized power, but
instead we have seen bureaucratic block after bureaucratic block put between
them and reaching safety with their families.
“The government must apply common sense
and compassion to its policies – whether it is biometrics or language
requirements.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The UK
has made an ambitious and generous commitment to help at-risk people in
Afghanistan and, so far, we have brought around 24,600 vulnerable people to
safety.
“The English language requirement was
introduced so that those coming to the UK are able to contribute and integrate
into society. We expect applicants to take these tests whenever possible but we
will consider details of any exceptional circumstances for those unable to do
so.”
Source: gulftoday.ae
https://www.gulftoday.ae/lifestyle/2023/08/21/afghan-women-cannot-join-husbands-in-uk-as-they-cannot-speak-english
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Trieste women bathe clothed in
solidarity with Muslim women
20 August 2023
(ANSA) - ROME, AUG 20 - A group of about
50 women and a few men bathed in their clothes on Sunday at Trieste's famous
gender-divided beach on Sunday to show solidarity with a group of Muslim women
who were prevented from taking a dip in their clothes or burkinis a week ago.
After taking to the water mainly in dresses
or casual summer wear, but some also in burkinis, one of the women said
"we too are wearing burkinis to say it was wrong to stop the other women
from bathing".
The protest dip took place at the
northeastern port city's historic Lanterna Beach, known to locals as Pedocin,
which has been split along gender lines since the first bathers took to the
water in the early 20th century. (ANSA).
Source: ansa.it
https://www.ansa.it/english/news/2023/08/20/trieste-women-bathe-clothed-in-solidarity-with-muslim-women_1550e0e9-c93d-42f7-8395-ee0be9f3b2ce.html
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Women bear the brunt of Taliban’s gender
apartheid
BARIA ALAMUDDIN
August 21, 2023
In a country where financial, health and
welfare systems have collapsed, half the population are starving, there are
four million drug addicts, and 20 percent suffer mental health problems, the
Taliban are obsessed with one policy agenda — robbing women of any kind of
purposeful existence.
Among the 80 decrees issued during the
Taliban’s two years in power in Afghanistan, 54 are explicitly directed at
women, with the objective of erasing their fundamental rights and liberties.
“Most of the girls from my class have
had suicidal thoughts. We are all suffering from depression and anxiety. We
have no hope.” These are the words of an Afghan girl in her early twenties who
should have her entire life ahead of her, but who tried to take her own life
after students were barred from attending university. A UN report found a surge
in women who had attempted suicide, with teenage girls, prevented from pursuing
education or careers, particularly vulnerable.
“Most of our patients lately are women;
women's rights activists, former government employees, journalists, and women
who were actively employed under the previous Afghan government but who have
now lost their jobs,” one mental health practitioner explained.
Given the extreme marginalization and
discrimination women have traditionally faced, Afghanistan has the dubious
distinction of being the only country where women have substantially higher
suicide rates than men, representing upwards of 80 percent of cases. Domestic violence levels are among the
highest in the world.
In one example of how women are treated
like voiceless units of exchange, an estimated 10 percent of marriages result
from a tribal custom in which a girl from a convicted criminal’s family is
provided in compensation to the victim’s relatives, as a servant or a bride. Eighty
percent of marriages occur without the consent of the bride, who frequently is
a child.
In some provinces the Taliban has
instructed schools to halt attendance for girls above Year 3, compared with the
current standard of Year 6. This corresponds to the Taliban’s manifesto, which
states that girls are mature adults from the age of 9.
The closure of beauty salons has erased
one of the few safe spaces where women could socially come together, taking
them one step closer to a nationwide life sentence of house arrest. The salons’
closure means another 60,000 women losing their incomes.
Yet Afghanistan does have one growth
area: Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada has mandated 100,000 jobs for the
madrassa sector, reallocating resources and staff away from mainstream
education. Tens of millions of dollars have been spent on hundreds of new
boys-only madrassas, with several million children to be enrolled. In remaining
schools starved of funding which haven’t been converted into madrassas, modern
subjects are replaced with Talibanized Islamic education.
The Taliban last month closed all 49 of
Afghanistan’s teacher training centers. This is particularly disastrous, as
more than half the staff in many education institutions have fled overseas.
“The depth and breadth of the changes
made by the Taliban’s higher education authorities — and their profound and
wide-ranging repercussions — point to a rapid and radical process of
Talibanization, theocratization and instrumentalization of higher education,”
one research paper warned. Foreign Policy magazine remarked: “An even bigger
problem than the girls who can’t go to school are the boys who do,” and the
“extremist curriculum is teaching children how to hate, not how to think.”
Although the Taliban are supposedly
combating Daesh, such anti-education policies are a gift for extremist groups,
nurturing a generation of men steeped in the most regressive and intolerant
interpretations of Islam, with no other skills or economic prospects.
Observers warn that the Taliban are turning
a blind eye to the expansion of Al-Qaeda, the Pakistani TTP, and other
like-minded entities, in explicit violation of the Taliban’s Doha Accord
commitments. Meanwhile, freedom of speech and media protections are
non-existent. Reporters sans Frontières this month warned that Afghanistan's
“media have been decimated.” Over 80 percent of female journalists lost their
jobs over the past two years.
In Donald Trump's ill-advised rush to
withdraw US assets from Afghanistan, his Doha Accord gave the Taliban
everything they wanted with no mechanism for holding them to account. Biden was
subsequently warned about the consequences of allowing the Taliban’s return to
power, but went ahead with his botched withdrawal anyway. After lip service
that the Taliban would be held to account, the world is largely distracted by
Ukraine and the Taliban have been allowed to proceed with the full extent of
its gender apartheid policies. States such as Turkey, Pakistan, Russia, Iran,
India and China are sidling towards de facto diplomatic recognition. China in
particular has stepped up investment and engagement, seeing Afghanistan as a
key plank in its Belt and Road strategy.
As with its promises under the Doha
Accord, practically every Taliban public statement and commitment to the world
has been a lie — starting with pledges to protect women’s rights, and finishing
with rhetoric about preventing Afghanistan reemerging as a global jihad staging
point.
The UN Security Council advocates an
international “multipronged strategy” toward the Taliban. This would include
ensuring full compliance with the Doha Accord; encouraging a greater role for
centrist political and civil society actors – including women; and facilitating
broad-based national dialogue. To promote human rights, combat corruption and
enshrine the rule of law, international legal bodies should be given full
jurisdiction.
The Taliban multiheaded hydra is as much
at war with itself as the outside world. Just because Hibatullah’s regressive
hardliners dictate policy today doesn’t mean that relative pragmatists won’t be
pulling the strings tomorrow — particularly as it is obvious to all external
and domestic observers that Afghanistan is a profoundly sick country in need of
healing and rehabilitation, and no nation can thrive when the female component
is oppressed and marginalized.
We can state with absolute certainty
that women are Afghanistan’s future, with all their capabilities, energies and
wisdom. Such a vision stands in stark contrast with the ignorant, regressive
and extremist minds that Hibatullah’s madrassas seek to cultivate.
The only question is how much
unnecessary misery, repression and deprivation the Taliban will subject this
long-suffering nation to before acknowledging this inescapable fact.
• Baria Alamuddin is an award-winning
journalist and broadcaster in the Middle East and the UK. She is editor of the
Media Services Syndicate and has interviewed numerous heads of state.
Source: arabnews.com
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2358546
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A woman can live, fight and progress
without a man: President Droupadi Murmu
By: PTI
New Delhi: August 21, 2023
President Droupadi Murmu on Monday
hailed ‘Nari Shakti’ and said women have scaled great heights in various fields
ranging from “missile to music” by overcoming several odds.
She was speaking at an event held by the
Army Wives Welfare Association (AWWA) at the Manekshaw Centre here.
“I extend my gratitude to all ‘Veer
Naris’ for their contribution and praise the efforts of the AWWA,” the
president said.
During the event, an entrepreneur
married to an army man and a teacher from Jharkhand, who is a ‘Veer Nari’,
narrated gritty and painful tales of their lives, and how they surmounted the
odds with their determination and spirit of resilience.
“We heard painful stories of two women,
we should rather say, two stories of grit and determination today…it sent
chills down the spine,” Murmu said. That’s why it is called Nari Shakti, she
asserted.
There is an old saying that behind every
successful man, there is a woman, but, today it should be instead said that
“beside every successful man, there is a woman”, President Murmu said.
In her address, the president hailed
‘Nari Shakti’ and underlined the contributions made by women in the progress of
society and the nation at large.
“From missiles to music, women have
achieved great heights, facing and overcoming all odds,” she said.
AWWA president Archana Pande, in her
address, hailed Murmu for her accomplishments and said that the president
herself “exemplified ‘Nari Shakti'”.
Before attending the event, President
Murmu was given a tour of various stalls put up by members of the association
which promotes self-reliance, entrepreneurship among women to empower them.
Sudesh Dhankhar, wife of Vice President
Jagdeep Dhankhar, and Minister of State for External Affairs and Culture
Meenakashi Lekhi also attended the event.
Source: indianexpress.com
https://indianexpress.com/article/india/woman-live-fight-progress-without-man-president-8902152/
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Uttar Pradesh Muslim couple killed after
son elopes with Hindu woman
Aug 21, 2023
According to SP Chakresh Mishra, the
alleged attack took place at Rajepur village under Hargaon police station on
Friday
A Muslim couple in Uttar Pradesh’s
Sitapur district was allegedly beaten to death by neighbours after their son
reportedly eloped with a Hindu woman two months ago, police said on Sunday.
While three people have been arrested, efforts are on to nab two others, they
added.
Read here: Muslim couple threatened,
prevented from watching ‘Kantara’ in Karnataka
The deceased were identified as Abbas
Ali (55) and his wife, Kamrul Nisha (53). Besides a 28-year-old son, the
deceased couple had three minor daughters,
According to Sitapur superintendent of
police (SP) Chakresh Mishra, the alleged attack took place at Rajepur village
under Hargaon police station on Friday.
“At around 5pm on Friday, Ali and Nisha
were sitting outside their house when they were allegedly attacked and thrashed
to death by neighbours,” the SP said. The couple died on the spot, he added.
The SP said that following the attack, a
first information report (FIR) was registered against five people, namely
Shailendra Jaiswal, Rampal Jaiswal, Amarnath, Rampati and Pallu, under various
sections, including 302 (murder), of Indian Penal Code on the basis of
information provided by the villagers.
While Shailendra, Amarnath and Pallu
have been arrested, a search is on for the remaining two, Mishra said.
According to the police, the couple’s
son, Shaukat, was arrested in 2020 for reportedly abducting Rampal’s then
17-year-old daughter, Ruby, following a complaint by the latter. Shaukat was
released six months later. In 2021, Rampal got his daughter married.
In June this year, Shaukat reportedly
eloped with Rampal’s daughter, prompting the latter’s family to register a
fresh abduction case. The case, however, was dropped after the two were found
and the woman said she willingly left with Shaukat. The woman did not return
home and continued to stay with Shaukat, police said.
Police said that a few days after the
incident, in July, Shaukat was again arrested and sent to jail in connection
with an old case pertaining to cow slaughter. He was released on bail from
prison on August 16.
“The two incidents (purported abduction
and elopement) led to animosity between the two families,” the SP said.
Source: hindustantimes.com
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/muslim-couple-beaten-to-death-in-uttar-pradesh-allegedly-over-son-s-elopement-with-hindu-woman-101692556758538.html
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/indian-supreme-court-rape-pregnancy/d/130491