The legal ramifications of the recently promulgated Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Ordinance, 2020 are examined by juxtaposing popular perceptions of inter-religious marriages as “dishonourable” to the concerned families and communities, with a feminist perspective of women’s agency and exercise of choice in marriage. The key to preventing the phenomenon of conversion for marriage lies not in enacting draconian legislations that arm the state machinery with arbitrary powers, but in streamlining and simplifying procedures under the Special Marriage Act, 1954 that allow for inter-religious marriages without religious conversion of either person.
