An excerpt from Khan v. Azeez, decided yesterday by the Louisiana Court of Appeal, in an opinion by Judge Shannon J. Gremillion, joined by Judges D. Kent Savoie and Candyce G. Perret:
Khan and Azeez are citizens of India and were married there in 2003 but have resided in the United States since 2007. They first lived in Maryland, then moved to Quincy, Illinois in 2017. They are the parents of two teenaged children, one born in 2005 and the other in 2008. Khan and Azeez traveled to India in November 2018, whereupon Khan deserted his wife taking her passport with him.
He was then unilaterally granted a divorce under Islamic law by uttering of the word "talaq" (divorce) three times, a practice which India declared illegal and unconstitutional on July 31, 2019, retroactive to September 19, 2018, under the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Act. It states that a declaration of triple talaq is void and illegal and "any pronouncement of talaq by a Muslim husband upon his wife, by words, either spoken or written or in electronic form or in any other manner whatsoever, shall be void and illegal" and subjects the husband to a three year prison term and a fine. Upon her eventual return to the United States in March 2019, Azeez immediately filed a petition for dissolution of marriage in an Adams County, Illinois court on March 13, 2019.
Khan objected to the Illinois court's jurisdiction arguing he had been divorced via the talaq method [and that there had been an Indian court judgment acknowledging the divorce -EV] …. [T]he Illinois trial court denied Khan's exception finding that the UCCJEA (Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act) and basic principles of human rights required a finding that the divorce by talaq and any subsequent child custody determinations were invalid….
