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ShareSrinagar: The Jammu and Kashmir High Court has directed police to take a Sikh girl into protective custody after her marriage to a Muslim boy triggered protests by her community, which alleged that she was kidnapped and coerced to embrace Islam.
Justice JP Singh yesterday passed the direction after the girl, Amritpaul Kaur (now Asiya), contested her father Mahinderpaul Singh's allegations and deposed before the court that she was an adult and had married Imran Ahmad Dagga out of her own free will.
The couple tied the knot last month but their marriage was surrounded by controversy after Singh registered a report at Parimpora police station accusing Dagga of kidnapping his daughter and coercing her to embrace Islam.
The court, after hearing the counsel for petitioner and defense, directed authorities to allow the girl, a physio-therapist, to remain with her husband, a driver by profession in Bemina locality in Jammu.
It also directed police to take the girl in "protective custody". She was later kept in Rambagh police station.
The marriage also triggered protests by the Sikh community in Jammu with activists of various political outfits including Shiromani Aali Dal, BJP, National Sikh Youth Front, Shiv Sena, Dogra liberation front and the RSS staging demonstration, demanding return of the girl to her parents.
