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This article is an ethnographic exploration of a women’s sharia court in Mumbai, a part of a network of such courts run by women qazi (Islamic judges) established across India by members of an Islamic feminist movement called the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (Indian Muslim Women’s Movement). Building upon observations of adjudication, counselling, and mediation offered in cases of divorce and maintenance by the woman qazi (judge), and the claims made by women litigants on the court, this article explores the imaginaries of the heterosexual family and gendered kinship roles that constitute the everyday social life of Islamic feminism. I show how the heterosexual family is conceptualised as a fragile and violent institution, and divorce is considered an escape route from the same. I also trace how gendered kinship roles in the heterosexual conjugal family are overturned as men fail in their conventional roles as providers and women become breadwinners in the family. In tracing the range of negotiations around the gendered family, I argue that the social life of Islamic feminism eludes the discourses and categories of statist legal reform. I contribute to existing scholarship on Islamic feminism by exploring the tension between the institutionalist and everyday aspects of Islamic feminist movements, and by exploring the range of kinship negotiations around the gendered family that take place in the shadow of the rhetoric of ‘law reform’ for Muslim communities in India.

Due the lack of the law of evidence in criminal matters in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), it is important to address the issue of the rules of evidence in the UAE where Sharia criminal law is applied along with enacted law of Criminal Procedural Law. The courts’ decisions contradicted each other because of the differences of opinions among the law schools exist in Islamic law in one hand and between the Sharia criminal law and enacted law in the other hand. Further, the Criminal Procedural Law does not state the rules of evidence in clear manner to judges and individuals. The lack of stated rules and procedures and what evidence could be accepted and what cannot are not definite in the UAE legal system. The article will argue that because of the differences in the opinions related to the admission and acceptance of the evidences exist among the Islamic law schools and between the Sharia law and enacted law, the court decisions have contradicted each other and create ambiguities in the field of the evidence in criminal law. The Islamic jurists have different opinions about evidence in fornication crimes, Qasama evidence in qisas , and women and non-Muslim testimonies. Such differences affect the Union Supreme Court decisions. Therefore, the UAE legislator must enact the law of evidence in criminal matters in order to reduce the contradiction between judges’ opinions, clear ambiguities, and protect individual rights as it did with civil and commercial matter.

Pakistan is the first Muslim country, which recognized women's unilateral right to no-fault judicial divorce (khul') under Islamic family law in 1959. In contemporary Pakistan, Muslim women have the unilateral right to dissolve their marriages through summary court procedure. This has been made possible because of the gradual changes in case law and procedural law stretching over more than half a century. Despite questioning the validity of state-enforced Islamic divorce law on the basis that it is not in line with classical Islamic law (sharī'ah/fiqh), traditional 'ulamā' (religious scholars) accept the validity of court decrees of the dissolution of marriage based on khul'. As a result, the validity of judicial khul' under Islamic law is well established in Pakistan. This shows that the judges of the superior courts act as final arbiters by determining the binding interpretation of the Qur'ān and sunnah and the same has been approved by the 'ulamā'.

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 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.”

Among them were hundreds of Afghan women judges who not only feared reprisal from a new regime eager to stamp out the old judicial and legal system but also the re-imposition of strict rules forbidding girls and women to go to school, to work, or to participate in the cultural and economic lives of their communities. [...]I had the ability, even the authority, to prevent it, to protect people and implement the rule of law and justice. In Sharia law, mostly we studied verses of Holy Quran that have legal aspects, like some verses about marriage and deals, regulations, family law, inheritance, criteria of witness and valid documents, Hadith (the prophet's sayings), and actions and judgments, including legal opinions and judgments. Because I was involved in the legal system, and I saw myself that women were suffering from different kinds of violence, different kinds of injustice and inequality, I didn't want to be a doctor anymore. Because there was not gender equality in assigning to higher positions, [people with connections might be appointed] whether they were qualified to that rank or not.

Myanmar is the only Buddhism-majority country in the world that has developed and maintained a system of family law for Buddhists enforced by the courts. This article considers the construction of Burmese Buddhist law by lawyers, judges, and legislators, and the changes made through legislative intervention in 2015. It begins by addressing the creation and contestation of Burmese Buddhist law to demonstrate that it has largely been defined by men and by its perceived opposites, Hinduism and Islam. Three aspects of Burmese Buddhist law that affect women are then examined more closely. First, Burmese Buddhist law carries no penalties for men who commit adultery, although women may risk divorce and the loss of her property. Second, a man can take more than one wife under Burmese Buddhist law; a woman cannot. Third, restrictions on Buddhist women who marry non-Buddhist men operate to ensure the primacy of Burmese Buddhist law over the potential application of Islamic law. This article deconstructs the popular claim that women are better off under Burmese Buddhist law than under Hindu law or Islamic law by showing how Burmese Buddhist law has been preoccupied with regulating the position of women. The 2015 laws build on this history of Burmese Buddhist law, creating new problems, but also potentially operating as a new source of revenge.

A woman’s eligibility to be appointed as a judge in Shariah courts in Muslim societies has been a debated issue for decades. Although some Muslim majority countries, including Arab countries, have allowed women judges (Qudath) in Shariah courts, the Muslim Religious Leadership in Sri Lanka, namely All Ceylon Jamiyathul Ulama (ACJU) is opposed to such appointment to administrate Muslim matrimonial law on the basis of classical Muslim scholars’ discussion on the qualification of a judge (Qadi in Arabic), particularly referring to their debate on gender; however, women activists in Sri Lanka argue for women Quazi on the basis of women’s privacy and fair hearing. This article, therefore, explores the Islamic standpoint regarding women Quazi in Sri Lanka. Hence, this research studies the classical scholars’ discussions on the qualification of a judge (Qadi) critically and uses textual and document analysis to bring out the dynamic interpretations of the verses of the Quran and Hadiths that they used for their arguments. The contextual analysis was carried out to understand the various applications of these verses of the Quran and Hadiths in history, particularly in connection with the present situation for women in Sri Lanka. This research found no explicit verses of the Quran and Hadiths to allow or deny women Quazi. The positive and negative approach to women judges (Qudath) has been founded throughout history on the basis of Islamic scholars’ understanding of a few verses of the Quran and Hadith that are related to women leadership. This study recommends women Quazi for Sri Lankan Quazi courts by highlighting differences of context and insignificance of classical Muslim scholars’ debate on gender as a qualification of a judge (Qadi).

The issue of women serving as judges has been a contentious one in Egyptian society for nearly eight decades. While other Muslim majority countries started appointing women judges as early as the 1950s and 1960s, it was not until 2003 that the Egyptian government announced the appointment of its first ever female judge. Despite the approval of Egypt's religious scholars, her appointment was fiercely contested, among both the general public and the legal profession. In this paper we explore the question of why the appointment of women as judges provokes so much controversy in Egyptian society, and in the judiciary in particular. We show that the debate reveals a preoccupation with the proper place of women in society. With both traditionally educated religious scholars and people lacking formal religious training justifying their point of view by resorting to religious argumentation, the debate is also a clear example of the fragmentation of religious authority in Islam.

This article looks at the application of Islamic Family Law through decisions of the courts on matters of financial support for Muslim women after divorce in Bangladesh and Malaysia. The selection of the two countries was deliberate in that both are former British colonies with Muslim majority populations. In addition, both have ratified the United Nation's Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination on Women (CEDAW), with reservations. Comparative generalization is made, wherein selected cases of alimony in both countries are analysed. Although Bangladesh and Malaysia are both Muslim countries, there are differences and similarities in how the courts in both countries construe legal provisions in making rulings. The differences, as reflected in their decisions, are influenced by various factors, most notably relating to socio-cultural aspects.

Historians have neglected the reorganization of the Sharia courts in nineteenth-century Egypt, a process that paralleled the reorganization of the Ottoman imperial Sharia court system, and which coincided with the introduction of secular law codes that reduced the jurisdiction of the Sharia courts mainly to family law. New regulations introduced a hierarchical court structure, detailed the qualifications of personnel and the manner of their appointment, set fees, and defined legal procedures. Judges were restricted to Hanafi jurisprudence, insuring greater uniformity in their rulings, and an emphasis on the production of and reliance upon legal documents all but required Ottomans and Egyptians to bring their affairs—especially their family affairs—to the Sharia courts. These regulations affected the substance of Muslim family law as applied, even though it was not codified until the twentieth century. Hanafi law put married women at a disadvantage when seeking to collect arrears of maintenance or to dissolve their marriage due to non-support, desertion, or a husband gone missing. The Ottomans mitigated these disadvantages by allowing the application of Shafiʿi and Maliki law, which offered relief to women in these situations. However, in Egypt this was not done until the 1920s.