No triple talaq bill if Cong wins polls, says MP

Triggering a row, Mahila Congress chief and MP Sushmita Dev said the triple talaq bill was a tool that pitted Muslim men and women against each other and that the law would be scrapped if Congress was voted to power. The MP said Congress opposed the bill as it is a weapon PM Modi wanted to use to put Muslim men in jail.

Dev, Lok Sabha MP from Silchar, also said Congress had received "crores of letters" from Muslim women who carried out signature campaigns and rebelled against the proposed law and that the party had opposed the law in Parliament based on this.

"I promise you people that when the Congress government comes to power in 2019, we will scrap this law. But it is also a given that any law that is brought for empowerment of women, by whichever government, will have Congress' support," Dev said.

Even as her unilateral dismissal of the proposed law appeared to contradict Congress's previous, more nuanced position, on the subject, the party's media managers rushed to clarify that Dev's statement was only a reiteration of Congress's stated position that penal provisions in the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, 2018, must be dropped.

Asserting that Congress had opposed instant triple talaq even before it was struck down as illegal by the Supreme Court - where Congress lawyers appeared pro bono for some affected women - the party emphasised its opposition to passage of the triple talaq bill was on the ground that it did not answer the crucial question of how a man would provide for or maintain a woman and her children from within the confines of a jail.

"Congress's position has been clear that this bill cannot be used as a tool to deprive a woman and her family of maintenance. Modiji has not responded to these concerns raised by Congress, and it is for this reason that we opposed the bill," party spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said.

In December 2018, the government have moved a fresh bill in Lok Sabha to make triple talaq a penal offence resulting in a jail term of three years for the husband.