A Critical Appraisal of 'Triple Divorce' in Islamic Law

The issue of the ‘triple divorce’ is regarded ashighly sensitive among the Muslims, not only in India but elsewhere.The Holy Qur’an is very cautious in matters of divorce.Three talaqs have to be spaced over a period of 3 months togive husband and wife time for reconciliation through the interventionof relatives and friends. Moreover, talaq can be pronouncedonly when the wife is in a state of tuhur, ie purity after menstruation.Yet, despite clear Qur’anic injunctions to the contrary,immediate triple divorce is permitted, destroying marital lifein one breath. The practice of immediate triple divorce is widespreadamong Sunni Muslims and has legal validity. Even then the juristscall it a talaq-e-Bidat (innovative form of divorce). The disputehas been highlighted by reports of some Muslims instantly divorcingtheir wives by mail, over the telephone, and even through mobilephone text messages. This article explains the different theoriesof divorce prevailing in the contemporary Muslim world and whatchecks and restraints have been imposed by Islam over the exerciseof husband's power of talaq. The article critically appraisesthe ‘innovative triple divorce’ by examining whetherit is sanctioned by the Holy Quran or the sunnah and if thereis a consensus of opinion (ijma) on the effectiveness of tripledivorce.     

The structural sources of postcommunist regime trajectories

Regime trajectories in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (FSU) have diverged considerably since the collapse of communism. We argue that this variation is the product of two largely structural factors: the salience of anti-Soviet nationalism and the opportunity for membership in the European Union (EU) that was mostly the product of geography. In Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, anti-Soviet nationalism and the stimulus of EU democratic conditionality contributed to the rise of a non-communist elite that confronted serious internal and external pressure to democratize. By contrast, weaker anti-Soviet nationalism and dearth of pressure from the EU allowed for the persistence of communist elites who faced relatively weak external constraints on autocratic behavior. We argue that these structural factors played a more important role in accounting for variation in democratization across the postcommunist world than factors such as institutional design. At the same time, the different character of structural forces in Eastern Europe and the FSU has likely created greater room for voluntarist factors in determining regime variation within the former Soviet Union than within Eastern Europe.     

Eristalinus arvorum (Fabricius, 1787) (Diptera: Syrphidae) in Human Skull: A New Fly Species of Forensic Importance

A body of an unknown adult female was found within a shallow burial ground in Malaysia whereas the skull was exposed and visible on the ground. During autopsy examination, nine insect larvae were recovered from the interior of the human skull and subsequently preserved in 70% ethanol. The larvae were greyish in appearance, each with a posterior elongated breathing tube. A week after the autopsy, more larvae were collected at the burial site, and some of them were reared into adults. Adult specimens and larvae from the skull and from the burial site were sequenced to obtain DNA barcodes. Results showed all adult flies reared from the burial site, as well as the larvae collected from the skull were identified as Eristalinus arvorum (Fabricius, 1787) (Diptera: Syrphidae). Here, we report the colonization of E. arvorum larvae on a human corpse for the first time.     

The treatment of Chinese customary law in British colonial Hong Kong

A struggle has been underway in Beijing, othering Hong Kong’s British common law legal system by rhetorically subordinating it as a foreign colonial relic. How did the British develop their Hong Kong governance policies for proper law, as they ruled Hong Kong? These policies developed without resort to all the available scholarship, so that they could other the Hong Kong people into a subaltern group. Hong Kong was already constituted as a township with its own continuing township liturgy, customary ritual and social structure. The colonial administration ignored this, creating a Hong Kong subaltern.     

The securitisation of life: Eastern Kurdistan under the rule of a Perso-Shi'i state

Abstract

Since the 1979 Revolution, the Iranian state has adopted a sophisticated set of policies to assimilate the Eastern Kurds. The Kurds are often the main target of the Iranian state’s military operations, its assimilatory strategies, and its regime of surveillance. After the ‘conquest’ (fath) of Eastern Kurdistan (Rojhelat) in 1979, the state tried to retain control over the region through systemic militarisation, the establishment of ‘revolutionary institutions’, and new religious and cultural centres, to transform the demographic, religious and cultural profile of Kurdistan. This paper is an attempt to illuminate the state’s religious nationalism and various forms of assimilatory strategies that the Islamic Republic of Iran has employed to transform Kurdish regions.     

Going Global: Islamist Competition in Contemporary Civil Wars

The global landscape of modern jihad is highly diverse and wrought with conflict between rival Islamist factions. Within this inter-Islamist competition, some factions prove to be more robust and durable than others. This research proposes that the adoption of a global identity allows an Islamist group to better recruit and expand their domestic political power across ethnic and tribal divisions without being constrained by local politics. Islamists that rely on an ethnic or tribal identity are more prone to group fragmentation, whereas global Islamists are better able to retain group cohesion by purging their ranks of dissenters. To examine these two processes, I present original field research and primary source analysis to examine Islamist in-fighting in Somalia from 2006–2014 and then expand my analysis to Iraq and Syria, Pakistan, and Mali.     

Injustice and the New World Order: an anthropological perspective on “terrorism” in India

This article presents biographies of three activists of the Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI). Following 9/11, the Indian state banned SIMI for fomenting “terrorism”, “sedition” and “destroying Indian nationalism”. Of the three SIMI activists, Qasim Omar had spent 30 months in prison and Samin Patel, a US citizen of Indian origin, 27 months. Both these prominent SIMI leaders were charged with denigrating the photo of India’s flag and making provocative speeches. I interviewed them after their release. The third was an ordinary (non-office bearer) activist. Drawing on their biographies, I argue that Islamist radicalism or “terrorism” should be construed politically. Contrary to the prevalent politics, the pivot of which is bare rationality of profit and loss and ruthless pursuit of national interests, the kind of politics SIMI actors enact is best understood as a profound act of ethics manifest in the quest for justice. As such, they are not enemies of freedom, democracy and human rights; on the contrary, activists such as those in SIMI strive to rescue freedom and human rights from being monopolised and molested by the mighty few and thereby truly universalise them. Against methodological nationalism, I take the post-World War II global order as the human condition in which to situate the radical politics of these young SIMI activists.     

Communications

Abstract

Before I bring you up to date on the Harrisburg indictments ... there has been a second round of indictments since I last wrote ... I want to thank CCAS chapters for their immediate response to the January 12, 1971 indictment of fellow CCAS member, Eqbal Ahmad. We had so many speaking requests that we were unable to work all of them into Eqbal's extremely full schedule. We did make a lot of bread and each place that he spoke, for the most part, had well coordinated interplay of speaking, TV-radio appearances and cocktail parties.