A regressive and patently unconstitutional feature of recent anti-conversion laws enacted by different States is the criminalisation of inter-faith marriages by treating them as a means to convert one of the parties from one religion to another. While anti-conversion laws, euphemistically called in some States as laws on ‘freedom of religion’, have always sought to criminalise conversions obtained through fraud, force or allurement, the recent enactments or amendments have created “conversion by marriage” as one of the illegal forms of conversion. In its interim order protecting parties to inter-religious marriages from needless harassment, the Gujarat HC has made it clear that the “rigours” of the State’s amendments introduced earlier this year will not apply to marriages that do not involve any fraud, force or allurement. So, it has stopped the initiation of criminal proceedings against those who have married across religious faiths, unless there was any of these illegal elements. A Bench has rejected the State government’s attempt to adopt an innocent reading of the provisions of the Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021 , by claiming that inter-faith marriages that did not involve fraud or coercion and leading to conversion would not attract the penal provisions. The […]
