PFI leader AS Sainaba who is accused of brainwashing Hadiya to covert to Islam has told the Supreme Court that she converted of her own will and not all conversions were due to indoctrination, as per a report in The Times of India.
Citing the examples of reputed personalities like composer AR Rahman and boxer Muhammad Ali who embraced Islam, she said even Hadiya too embraced the religion of her own will.
"Numerous world-renowned intellectuals and personalities from totally different walks of life have embraced Islam everywhere in the world and no person can say that they embraced Islam due to indoctrination, brainwashing, radicalisation and so on. Madhavikutty, who embraced Islam at the age of 65 and modified her identity as Kamala Surayya, AR Rahman and Muhammad Ali are some examples," Sainaba said in her affidavit submitted at the SC.
Sainaba was responding to a notice by SC over a plea by Hadiya’s husband Shafin Jahan who challenged the Kerala High Court order annulling his marriage.
She refuted the allegation that there was a ‘love jihad’ conspiracy behind Hadiya’s conversion.
In her affidavit, Sainaba, who is one of the parties in the case, argued that the allegations against her were baseless, and she had no role to play in Hadiya’s religious conversion.
Stating that some organisations were putting undue pressure on people who had embraced Islam to re-convert, she urged the court to direct a probe against them.
She further argued that this was against the constitutional principle which guaranteed freedom of religion as a fundamental right.
Meanwhile, contending that the HC order set a bad precedent in law, Shafin told the SC that a court could not void a marriage between consenting adults over a plea by a third party.
Earlier, in her affidavit submitted on February 20, Hadiya asserted that she converted to Islam of her own will and wants to continue to live as a Muslim.
Describing the circumstances under which she converted to Islam from Hinduism, she said that she had been kept under prolonged confinement without the freedom she is entitled to.
"Even now I am under police surveillance. I most humbly pray that my entire liberty may kindly be restored to me," she said.
Hadiya’s case has been posted for further hearing on March 8.