Lucknow, March 16: The All India Muslim Women’s Personal Law Board today introduced its own version of the nikaahnama or marriage contract, looking to ban instant talaq and safeguard the wife’s interests after divorce.

The “sharayat (conditional) nikaahnama” denies the validity of the triple talaq as well as divorce through text message, email, telephone or videoconferencing. It spaces the divorce process out over three months so the partners can think it over.

It insists that marriages and divorces should be presided over by a qazi, and gives a divorced wife full rights over whatever gifts she receives during marriage or after.

The male-dominated All India Muslim Personal Law Board had earlier come out with its own “model nikaahnama” in April 2005, requiring couples to approach a qazi or a family court for divorce and discouraging the triple talaq.

However, that nikaahnama was criticised as not being women-friendly enough, especially since it advised the wife to be obedient and not to step out of home without permission.

“The model nikaahnama did not take care of women’s rights but our nikaahnama does,” said Shaista Amber, chairperson of the women’s board, formed in February 2005 by women social workers and members of political families.

“While the model nikaahnama is available only in Urdu, our nikaahnama is written in both Hindi and Urdu and can reach the common Muslim easily,” she added.

The new nikaahnama gives women the right to seek divorce, like the All India Shia Personal Law Board’s nikaahnama, introduced in November 2006, did. That nikaahnama, too, tried to ban the triple talaq.

But with male family members having the decisive say in marriages, the earlier two nikaahnamas have found few takers.

The sharayat nikaahnama sets down 17 guidelines for marriage and eight for divorce, forbidding forced dowry and fixing the minimum mehr (bridal gifts) at 30g and 618mg of silver. It gives details of the payment to be made by the husband in case of divorce.

Three forms are to be filled in, with a copy each kept by the groom, the bride and the qazi. The form has photographs of the bride and groom, whose address must be verified and attested.

All India Muslim Personal Law Board members, such as Zafaryab Jilani and Maulana Khalid Rasheed Firangimahli, were sceptical about the new nikaahnama’s success and claimed it contained nothing new.

“The clergy already discourages the triple talaq while accepting its validity,” Jilani said. “But it would be difficult to change traditions entrenched for centuries.”

Divorce through SMS, phone or email was not acceptable, he added, but that through mutual consent via videoconferencing was.

Firangimahli trashed the new nikaahnama as a “meaningless document introduced by mischievous people to divide and confuse Muslims”.

“Changing 1,400-year-old practices is a daunting task but we have done our best,” Amber said.