Bet­ter late than never. In a move steeped in cul­tural af­fir­ma­tion and le­gal recog­ni­tion, the Jammu and Kash­mir ad­min­is­tra­tion has fi­nally im­ple­mented the much-awaited Anand Mar­riage Act, by mak­ing rules there­un­der for the reg­is­tra­tion of Anand Karaj -Sikh mar­riages, mark­ing a sig­nif­i­cant tri­umph for the Sikh com­mu­nity. This de­vel­op­ment not only ush­ers in a new era of le­gal iden­tity for Sikh mar­riages in Jammu & Kash­mir but also ad­dresses a his­tor­i­cal de­mand for re­li­gious and cul­tural au­ton­omy.
It is an­other story that the move is be­ing per­ceived as an at­tempt to ap­pease the Sikhs, soon af­ter the Ar­ti­cle 370 Judge­ment by the Supreme Court of In­dia.
It also re­mains to be seen whether this will be­come im­ple­mentable im­me­di­ately or whether there will be ad­min­is­tra­tive glitches as are seen in many other states for which J & K Sikhs will have to wage an­other strug­gle. WSN re­ports.

The ‘Jammu and Kash­mir Anand Mar­riage Reg­is­tra­tion Rules, 2023’, as per the lat­est gov­ern­ment no­ti­fi­ca­tion, now pro­vide a le­gal frame­work for the reg­is­tra­tion of Sikh mar­riages, known as Anand Mar­riages, sol­em­nized through Sikh mar­riage cer­e­mony -Anand Karaj. This is a mon­u­men­tal step away from the erst­while ne­ces­sity of reg­is­ter­ing Sikh mar­riages un­der the Hindu Mar­riage Act or the Spe­cial Mar­riage Act, thereby rec­ti­fy­ing a long-stand­ing is­sue of cul­tural mis­align­ment.

Un­der these new rules, tehsil­dars -dis­trict rev­enue of­fi­cers, in their re­spec­tive ter­ri­to­r­ial ju­ris­dic­tions will serve as reg­is­trars for Anand Mar­riages.

Sikh cou­ples are re­quired to reg­is­ter their mar­riages within three months of the wed­ding cer­e­mony. How­ever, a late fee will be levied if they fail to meet this dead­line, as stip­u­lated by the De­part­ment of Law, Jus­tice, and Par­lia­men­tary Af­fairs in their No­vem­ber 30 no­ti­fi­ca­tion.

This is the cul­mi­na­tion of a per­sis­tent strug­gle by the Sikh com­mu­nity, who have long sought recog­ni­tion of their dis­tinct mar­riage rit­u­als. Vikram­jeet Singh, chair­man of the pro-BJP, Na­tional Sikh Front, em­pha­sized that the re­al­iza­tion of this de­mand be­came fea­si­ble fol­low­ing the ab­ro­ga­tion of Ar­ti­cle 370. He high­lighted the com­mu­ni­ty’s tire­less ef­forts in lob­by­ing for the Ac­t’s im­ple­men­ta­tion, not­ing that Jammu and Kash­mir had been an ex­cep­tion un­til now.

Sikh cou­ples in Jammu and Kash­mir are re­quired to reg­is­ter their mar­riages within three months of their Anand Karaj -Sikh wed­ding cer­e­mony. 

The ori­gins of the Anand Mar­riage Act trace back to 1909 when the British Im­pe­r­ial Leg­isla­tive Coun­cil rec­og­nized the Sikh wed­ding cer­e­mony, Anand Karaj. The Ac­t’s pri­mary goal was to re­spect and ac­knowl­edge the unique cus­toms of the Sikh com­mu­nity. De­spite the pass­ing of the Anand Mar­riage (Amend­ment) Bill in 2012, which brought Sikh tra­di­tional mar­riages un­der le­gal recog­ni­tion, the Ac­t’s im­ple­men­ta­tion in Jammu and Kash­mir re­mained pend­ing un­til now.

Surinder Singh of the Jammu Kash­mir Sikh Co­or­di­na­tion Com­mit­tee has wel­comed this move by the J&K ad­min­is­tra­tion.

While the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Anand Mar­riage Act in Jammu and Kash­mir is a tes­ta­ment to the re­lent­less ad­vo­cacy of the Sikh com­mu­nity, it is sig­nif­i­cant to ask why it has taken so much time to do so. Fur­ther­more, it is not lost on the Sikhs that it has come soon af­ter the judg­ment on Ar­ti­cle 370 by the apex court in In­dia.

An­other strik­ing fea­ture is that there are many more long pend­ing de­mands of the Sikh mi­nor­ity in Jammu and Kash­mir, which are be­ing ig­nored by the Jammu & Kash­mir gov­ern­ment and those call­ing the shots there.

Speak­ing to The World Sikh News, Jag­mo­han Singh Raina, Chair­per­son of the All Party Sikh Co­or­di­na­tion Com­mit­tee said, “This move is only a drop in the ocean of de­mands of the Sikh com­mu­nity of J & K. While the Pand­harpur Com­mis­sion, the CBI had probed the death of one in­no­cent per­son af­ter the Chit­tis­ing­pura mas­sacre, de­spite our meet­ing with the De­fence Min­is­ter of In­dia -Ra­j­nath Singh, there has been no proper en­quiry into the Chit­tis­ingh­pura mas­sacre.”

Iron­i­cally, the Kash­miri Pan­dits get reser­va­tion of 2 seats in the J&K As­sem­bly, whereas the tiny mi­nor­ity of Sikhs have been de­nied reser­va­tion,” he added.