SC to listen to pleas towards anti-conversion legal guidelines in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand
1 min read The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to listen to petitions difficult the constitutional validity of the legal guidelines handed towards illegal spiritual conversions by the states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Issuing a discover to the 2 governments, the courtroom posted the matter for listening to after 4 weeks.
The courtroom’s determination got here in response to a bunch of petitions which challenged the validity of the legal guidelines. One of the pleas contended the legal guidelines “curtails the Fundamental Rights of the citizen of India…disturbs the Basic Structure of the Constitution as laid down by the Law”.
Another plea says provisions of the Act and Ordinance violate Article 21 of the Constitution because it empowers the State to suppress a person’s private liberty. “The Act and Ordinance”, it submits, “seemed to be premised on conspiracy theories and assume that all conversions are illegally forced upon individuals who may have attained the age of majority”.
The two legal guidelines “are unconstitutional as both attempt to control the life of the residents of Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh and to not allow them to take charge of the significant decisions in their life”, the plea says.
Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Ordinance 2020 and the Uttarakhand Freedom of Religion Act, 2018, prohibit forceful prohibition of conversion for the needs of marriage. Himachal Pradesh additionally has an anti-conversion legislation, whereas the Madhya Pradesh Cabinet has authorised the Freedom to Religion Bill, 2020 as an Ordinance.
