Kerala High Court closes father's plea seeking whereabouts of Hadiya after bench told she is with second husband

The Kerala High Court on Friday closed the habeas corpus petition filed by the father of Hadiya, whose conversion to Islam and marriage to a Muslim in 2016 had created a big furore across the country..Justices Anu Sivaraman and C Pratheep Kumar closed the petition filed by Ashokan (Hadiya's father) after the Court was told that Hadiya’s first marriage was over, that she had married a second time and that she was now living with her second husband near Thiruvananthapuram.The submission was part of a prosecution’s report that stated that Hadiya had married another Muslim man and was residing with him.Therefore, after taking note that Hadiya was not in the illegal custody of anybody, the Court decided to close the habeas corpus plea..In the said plea, Hadiya’s father, Ashokan had raised concern that his daughter was under the illegal custody of certain persons and urged the Court to direct that Hadiya be produced before the Court."Whenever the petitioner called the detenu for the last one month, the detenu is not receiving any calls and on many occasions, the mobile phone was switched off. On 03/12/2023, the petitioner went to the clinic and found it is closed. The neighbours told the petitioner that they don’t have any idea about the same. Now the petitioner apprehends that she has been moved to the illegally custody of the place and control of the respondents 3 and 4. Now the detenu is in the illegal custody of the persons under collusion and connivance of the 4th and 6th respondent. So the detenu is to be released at the earliest," the petition said..The petition marked the second round of litigation surrounding Hadiya (earlier known as Akhila) half a decade after the first controversy broke out in 2016-2017.In 2016, Ashokan moved the Kerala High Court with a similar habeas corpus petition alleging that Hadiya’s first husband, Shafin Jahan had detained her illegally.In a judgment dated 25 May, 2017, a division bench of the Kerala High Court annulled her marriage terming it to be a “sham” and directed that Hadiya be placed in the protective custody of her Hindu parents or an institution, so that she is prevented from being a further victim of “love jihad.” The High Court also directed a detailed inquiry into the role of various organisations involved in the case.However, Jahan filed an appeal before the Supreme Court against the High Court judgment which was criticised for trammeling upon the decisional autonomy of an adult woman, and had also given rise to a wave of protests across Kerala.In 2018, in a significant judgment, the Supreme Court set aside the judgment of the Kerala High Court. However, the Court held that the investigation by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the matter will continue.“The High Court unwarrantably took exception to the same forgetting that parental love or concern cannot be allowed to fluster the right of choice of an adult in choosing a man to whom she gets married,” the judgment stated.The apex court further stated that the High Court erred in reflecting upon social radicalization and other aspects. It opined that if there was any criminality in any sphere, it was for law enforcement agency to do the needful.The NIA later closed the case..In the habeas corpus plea filed earlier this month, Ashokan claimed that the marriage between Hadiya and Jahan is only on paper and that there is no actual marital relationship between them. He said that the homeopathy clinic that Hadiya had started after she completed her medicine course, closed sometime back.He also alleged that Hadiya is sick, both mentally and physically.He further reiterated his earlier contention that Hadiya is being forced to learn the teachings for "joining Islam."The High Court has now closed this habeas corpus plea after taking note of Hadiya’s second marriage and the report that she was residing with her husband.