Abstract
Building upon participant observation in a women’sshariacourt in Mumbai, run by activists of an Islamic feminist movement in India, and its networks with similar alternative dispute resolution forums run by maleqazis(non-state actors trained in Islamic law and Muslim personal law), this article explores the modalities of interaction between non-state actors who adjudicate Muslim personal law in India. It also delineates how gendered agency is shaped in these interactions. This article identifies three aspects of this interaction between male and female non-state actors: (1) everyday cooperation between male and female qazi despite their doctrinal differences; (2) the gradual assertion of female qazi in and through everyday cooperation with male qazi; and (3) institutional competition interlaced with everyday cooperation. I explore a range of interactions including contestation and collaborative contestation between non-state actors, a domain that has not been explored in existing scholarship on legal pluralism. I also draw attention to how we might think about women’s agency in a legal pluralist context beyond a straightforward challenge to male authority and as it is forged at the intersection of individuals, interactions, and institutions. Through a critical exploration of women’s agency, I show how women both inhabit and transform gender norms at an individual and institutional level in their interactions with non-state actors and institutions, expanding scholarship on legal pluralism and gender beyond reified “women’s interests.”
Highlights
A narrow serpentine by-lane off the Western Express Highway in Mumbai leads to the women’s sharia court of the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA; Indian Muslim Women’s Movement)
This article is based on participant observation carried out over eleven months in a women’s sharia court in Mumbai that is part of a network of such alternative dispute resolution forums run by the BMMA, an Islamic feminist movement in India
The difference in their attitudes demonstrates the different ways in which the BMMA and organizations such as the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) understood the role of the state and religion in adjudicating Muslim personal law in India
Summary
Building upon participant observation in a women’s sharia court in Mumbai, run by activists of an Islamic feminist movement in India, and its networks with similar alternative dispute resolution forums run by male qazis (non-state actors trained in Islamic law and Muslim personal law), this article explores the modalities of interaction between non-state actors who adjudicate Muslim personal law in India. It delineates how gendered agency is shaped in these interactions. Through a critical exploration of women’s agency, I show how women both inhabit and transform gender norms at an individual and institutional level in their interactions with non-state actors and institutions, expanding scholarship on legal pluralism and gender beyond reified “women’s interests.”
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