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Logan
10-24-2011, 06:51 PM
A growing number of young Muslims in the UK are entering marriages that are not legally recognised, BBC Asian Network has found. This is because couples are having an Islamic wedding without the civil ceremony needed for the marriage to be recognised under British law.

Shaheeda Khan married her fiance in a traditional Islamic religious ceremony, the nikah, at her home in Birmingham.

After the wedding the couple moved to London where they started to build a life and home together but, 13 months into the marriage, Shaheeda realised that her nikah was not legally valid.

''I had to show a marriage certificate when I was enrolling at university. It was then I realised I didn't have one and it came as a big shock to me," she said.

Shaheeda, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, said she asked her husband to register their marriage but he was against the idea.

A few months later she came home and found that the locks to her front door had been changed and that she had been thrown out of her home.

"I was homeless. I took legal action but I got nothing," explained Shaheeda. "I had been paying the mortgage on our home but the house was not in my name so I lost everything.''

Eventually, Shaheeda moved back home with her family.

''It was as though the marriage had never happened. It was the worst time of my life,'' she added.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8493660.stm


New Sharia law marriage contract gives Muslim women rights

Muslim women are to be guaranteed equal rights in marriage under a new wedding contract negotiated by leading Islamic organisations and clerics in Britain.


Hailed as the biggest change in Sharia law in Britain for 100 years, a married Muslim couple will now have equal rights. A husband will have to waive his right to polygamy, allowed under Islamic law, in the new contract which has been described as "revolutionary".


Currently Muslims in Britain have an Islamic ceremony called a nikah (a non register office marriage) which, although it is guaranteed under Sharia law, is not legally binding and does not provide a woman with written proof of the marriage and of the terms and conditions agreed between the spouses.


Dr Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, Director of the Muslim Institute and one of the authors of the contract, told The Daily Telegraph: "The document is a challenge to various sharia councils who don't believe in gender equality but the world has changed and Islamic law has to be renegotiated."


The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, was criticised earlier this year when he called for greater recognition of Sharia in British civil legislature, a view that was echoed recently by the Lord Chief Justice Phillips.


Ann Cryer, a Labour MP who has campaigned for the rights of Muslim women, welcomed today's change, saying: "This document has been carefully researched over a four year period and I feel confident in recommending its findings to women (and men) of the Muslim Faith contemplating Marriage."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2518720/New-Sharia-law-marraige-contract-gives-Muslim-women-rights.html

The Queen ought to replace this fellow, and Phillips should step down.:cool:

Contra Mundum
10-24-2011, 07:46 PM
Diversity enriches us.

arcticwolf
10-24-2011, 07:59 PM
The blessings of multiculturalism. Sigh