The Kerala High Court on Friday, December 15, closed the habeas corpus plea filed by Hadiya’s father Asokan, after Hadiya’s counsel submitted in court that she is currently staying with her second husband. The division bench comprising Justice Anu Sivaraman and Justice C Pratheep found the father’s plea was not maintainable, noting that Hadiya was living freely and not under any “illegal custody”. 

A 32-year-old homeopathy doctor from Kerala, Hadiya was first thrust into the spotlight in 2016 after her conversion to Islam and subsequent marriage to a man named Shafin Jahan resulted in allegations of ‘love jihad’ and a series of court cases. Her father filed the latest petition in the first week of December, alleging that his daughter was missing and he has been unable to contact her for one and a half months. He did so allegedly after learning that Hadiya had divorced her first husband and remarried. 

Hadiya, however, stated in court that she has been living in Thiruvananthapuram after getting remarried. She also submitted her call recordings as proof to show that she was in contact with her parents. In an interview she gave to The Print, she said she is now married to a man named Khalid, a remarriage that opened up a new chapter in her life. She also said she wished to reopen her clinic in Thiruvananthapuram. 

Speaking to TNM after her father’s latest petition, Hadiya alleged that her father was a tool in the hands of the Sangh Parivar, which forced him to take this step. “I maintained constant communication with my parents until recently, right up to the point when the habeas corpus writ was filed. It was only then that I stopped calling them. Contrary to any notion of me being missing, I have always been accessible and available to them,” she said.

“I am a 32-year-old woman, and in our society, marriages and remarriages are commonplace. Why should it be an issue when I choose to do the same?” she asked.

Hadiya’s father had first filed a habeas corpus petition in the Kerala High Court in 2016, after her controversial conversion and marriage to Shafin. During the hearing of the case, Hadiya appeared in court in December 2016 and asserted that Shafin was her husband. This led to a probe and the annulment of their marriage by the High Court in May 2017. Later in 2018, in a judgment upholding the personal choice of a woman to choose her life partner, the Supreme Court set aside the order of the Kerala High Court.