Talaq via SMS is cruel: Malaysian minister

Talaq via SMS is cruel: Malaysian minister

Source: PTI.

Kuala Lumpur, Apr 6 : Coming out strongly against Muslim men getting into the habit of divorcing their wives using new technologies like SMS, a Malaysiam minister has said that the practice was cruel and disrespectful of women.

"Muslim men who divorce their wives via SMS are cruel and disrespectful of women. A wife should never be treated in such a manner as if she has no dignity and can be divorced with impunity," the Women and Family Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Shahrizat Jalil said.

Responding to a querry on a much publicised case in which a leading singer was divorced by her husband through SMS, the minister told 'The Star' newspaper that technologies such as SMS should not be misused to send out a divorce declaration.


"While a husband has the right to divorce his wife, this should be done in a courteous and dignified manner, befitting the manner they had got married," she said.

Jalil said if this practice was allowed to continue, it could "belittle the importance of marriage".

Noting that 'SMS' divorces did not conform to the provisions stipulated under Muslim family law, she said, "the law stipulates that the best way to declare a divorce is to do it in the Islamic court." The singer, Noraniza, had sought the court's ruling on whether she was divorced by virtue of the SMS by her husband Fareez in September last year.

On Tuesday, the Islamic court declared that Noraniza was still legally married to Fareez although he had sent the SMS, the report said.


I think Muslim personal laws are downright anti-women and highly discriminatory. That these kind of things can happen to even "so called educated" people is indeed shameful!

Forget what the uneducated people will do then.

In this age of instant everything, somewhere people are fast losing their sense of what is dignified and what isnt.

While this is for each individual to decide what it is they really want in life and how they want their life to move ahead, some kind of balance between the two ideas of freedom and regulation would be nice.

It is difficult but can always be worked out.