I’m a 19 year old girl and i got married in August 2007. My parents took me to and got me married to a distantly related cousin whom I had never met or seen in my life. My parents hadn’t met him before either but had agreed to get me married to him before travelling to . Although I wasn’t very happy about getting married at the age of 18 and getting married to a man from Pakistan I hoped for the best and got married to him as my parents wouldn’t take no for an answer.
On my wedding night I was on my menstrual period. I was very shy too and thought my husband would treat me with respect on my first night with him. He was already notified about my period by his family because I told his sister as I was very afraid. However, on the night he began to get close to me, at this point I spoke up and said to him that I was on my period and that I didn’t want him to touch me as it was haraam. This was very embarrassing for me as well but I thought after hearing this he would back off. Unfortunately he got angry and turned his face away, so I said to him sorry and tried to make up with him. He would just repeatedly try and come close to me and in the end he ended up raping me. I can’t tell you how hurt and upset I was, it was so unexpected and cruel.
However, the next day I had to hide the tears are pretend I was happy as I didn’t wish to hurt my parents and I was afraid of what people would say so I left it and thought I will forgive him and try to live with him. However for the time that followed, even after I came back to the and then when he came here to live with me all we did was argue. There was no trust, no love and no respect in my heart for him though I tried several times to accept him. Although I was trying my best to make the marriage work he still didn’t care about me, he hit me whilst living in my house and constantly argued with me. I couldn’t even get myself to like him let alone love him.
In the end my parents could see that I was not happy and so asked me to tell them what was going on so I told them that I just can’t get along with him. It may seem like something very small however its affected me in a big way. And it’s not just because of that, personality wise we have never got on with each other and I can never get myself to have feelings for him. For this reason I expressed my wish to leave him rather then stay put in a love-less marriage and not be able to fulfil his rights. Also he has been living in my house and was unable to get a job and so he hasn’t provided for me at all and we have both been living on my dad’s earnings.
He was sent back to ; however before leaving he wrote on paper that he was divorcing me. He wrote this once and signed it and my cousin and dad were there as witnesses.
I wanted to know:
1) Are my grounds of getting a divorce correct or was it better for me to stay in the marriage regardless of the fact that we don’t get along?
2) Has the divorce happened? Is it valid even though he did not say it verbally? Does he have to say it/ write it another 2 times or is once enough?
3) Is this an irrevocable divorce? Or could things be amended during the period of Iddah?
4) Is it permissible for me to go to work during the period of Iddah? I need the job and will lose it if I don’t go for that long.
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful
Assalaamu `alaykum waRahmatullahi Wabarakatuh
It is unfortunate that you were forced into the marriage. That should have never been the case. Kindly forward the exact words of divorce for us to issue a ruling. If your husband issued you one written divorce in the past or present tense, it will be valid. The divorce will be talaqe-raji (revocable divorce) which will be converted to talaqe-bain (irrevocable divorce) upon the expiry of iddat if your husband does not revoke the divorce.
If you do not have any means to support you during and after the iddat, you will be excused to continue your wok. Obviously, you should practice on the laws of hijab to the best of your abilities.
And Allah Ta’ala Knows Best
Wassalamu Alaykum
Mufti Ebrahim Desai
Darul Iftaa, Madrassah In’aamiyyah