The Bhupendra Patel government’s latest announcement on amending the state’s Registration of Marriages Act, 2006, to mandate parental consent for marriage breaches several legal boundaries. Parental consent is not required for court marriage in India if both parties are adults (the groom is at least 21 years old and the bride is at least 18 years old) and they give free and valid consent under the Special Marriage Act, 1954.
Just last week, the Allahabad High Court, in a significant ruling, held that the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021, neither prohibits interfaith marriages nor bars such couples from living together in a live-in relationship (Noori and Another vs State of UP).
The Gujarat government’s proposal carries Orwellian parallels. The state’s Deputy Chief Minister, Harsh Sanghavi, stated that the state government was going to bring changes in the marriage registration procedure in the state to stop its misuse by “anti-social elements”. He reportedly alluded to those who hide their identity to “trap daughters of Gujarat” for the oft-quoted “love jihad”. The move, according to the minister, is aimed at “protecting dignity of girls and sanatan dharma.”
Under the proposed amendments, the bride and groom will have to submit a declaration stating that they have informed their parents about the marriage. Additionally, they need to submit identity proof of their parents, phone numbers, and residential proof. They will be a 30-day period for all this to be verified by designated officials before the marriage can go ahead.
On the face of it, such a move is nothing short of outrageous and regressive, apart from violating Article 21 of the Constitution which guarantees that “no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law”. It is a fundamental right available to all individuals—citizens and non-citizens—and serves as the cornerstone of personal freedom, prohibiting arbitrary state action regarding life and liberty. Article 21 is often referred to as “the heart of the Constitution”.
Gujarat is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state and the latest proposal also contradicts his frequent references to nari shakti and sabka vikas as being crucial to India’s development.
The Supreme Court and High Courts have always stayed firm in protecting Article 21. While hearing the landmark marriage equality case [Supriyo versus Union of India (2023)], the then Chief Justice of India, DY Chandrachud, called the 30-day notice period an invasion of privacy and being “steeped in patriarchy”. He observed how such public notification enables state actors like the district magistrate and the superintendent of police to invade their privacy. Moreover, the Court raised the concern over how this makes the marginalised groups even more vulnerable to injustice as interference in decisional autonomy is sanctioned by the law itself. In fact, what the Gujarat government’s proposal does is to widen communal faultlines.
Other than Justice Chandrachud’s observations, judicial precedents have strongly supported Article 21. In the case of [Safiya Sultana versus State of Uttar Pradesh (2021)], Justice Vivek Chaudhary of the Allahabad High Court ruled that forcing couples to go public with their intent to marry is a violation of the fundamental right to privacy under Article 21. Now, in Uttar Pradesh, a marriage officer can publish such a notice only if the couple specifically requests for it in writing.
The body of Supreme Court judgments have declared that adults need no one’s permission to marry, least of all the government’s endorsement of a parental veto. High Courts also routinely protect couples seeking police protection from their families. On February 16, the Gujarat High Court allowed a 16-year-old girl, who refused to return to her parents, to stay in government care. The minor’s parents had objected to her relationship with a boy of her choice, although the two were willing to wait to “attain marriageable age”.
The Supreme Court has over the past two decades repeatedly affirmed that the right to choose one’s partner is intrinsic to personal liberty. In [Lata Singh versus State of Uttar Pradesh (2006)], the Court upheld the legitimacy of inter-caste marriages and warned against familial interference. In [Shafi Jahan versus KM Ashokan (2018)], it declared that an adult’s choice of spouse lies beyond the control of courts or parents. More recently, in [Laxmibai Chandaragi versus State of Karnataka (2021)], it emphasised that once two adults agree to marry, the law must protect, not obstruct, their union.
The Gujarat government’s move is overtly aimed at preventing interfaith or inter-caste marriages. Numerous Supreme Court rulings have clearly said that the choice of an individual is an inextricable part of dignity and that such a right is not expected to succumb to notions of class honour or group thinking. It has also directed police authorities to frame guidelines and training programmes to handle socially sensitive cases involving the right to marry.
In the 2018 case of Shafi Jahan versus KM Asokaan, the apex court upheld an individual’s right to marry a person of their choice and to choose a religion, overruling a Kerala High Court verdict that had annulled an interfaith marriage by invoking parens patriae jurisdiction and describing a 24-year-old woman as weak and vulnerable. That Latin phrase refers to a legal doctrine empowering the state to act as guardian for individuals unable to care for themselves.
As The Tribune noted in an editorial on the Gujarat government’s proposed move, “Marriage registration is an administrative act. It cannot be converted into a mechanism for social surveillance. For many couples, especially interfaith or inter-caste partners, mandatory parental notification may invite harassment, coercion or even violence. The State cannot outsource adult autonomy to family approval.”
Moreover, there are laws in place that address forced marriages and identity fraud, which is what the deputy chief minister of Gujarat is so obsessed about. If India is to maintain its status as a functioning democracy, it is duty bound to trust its adult citizens to make their own life choices. The core issue is the creeping invasion by state governments over individuals and their private lives.
Gujarat is not the first. Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh have enacted laws against what they call “forced conversions” and interfaith unions. In Uttarakhand, live-in couples are required to register with state authorities.
Orwell’s 1984 depicted a state where the suppression of truth, freedom of thought, and individuality were strictly enforced. Gujarat seems to have plagiarised some extracts from the book.
—The writer is former Senior Managing Editor, India Legal magazine
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