Bhai, tajhe to vakil hona chahiye tha, jethmalani ki chutti kar deta.
Thanks for all the references.
1. Kamini Lau judgment: The court didn't declare a same gotra marriage as illegal. This is not new news to us. Given the current HMA, that interpretation is quite clear. It doesn't mean that the custom has been declared as invalid or the community is not allowed to follow it. It just means that no one is forced to follow a custom, which is the same provision for all communities.
2. Conversion cases: The first 3 cases involve polygamy. The issue here is of Hindu males converting to Islam to marry another woman. This compromises the rights of first wife, that court protects in its judgment. Also, the males were Hindu during first marriage. So HMA applies to them. The prevention of abuse of someone's rights is clear from this para as well- "From the above it is clear that after the pronouncement of the aforesaid judicial verdicts, polygamy is no more a valued person for religious conversion into Islam." The Kulundurivalu case is related to adoption and property rights- again someone's rights were compromised here.
No one's rights (as seen in law) are compromised when 2 hitherto unmarried people convert before marriage. The interesting phrase to note is in the Vilayat Raj case, "it was observed by the court that if both the parties to the marriage were Hindu at the time of marriage... ". It says AT the time of marriage. That is significant. What if they are not Hindu at the time of marriage, that is, they convert before marriage? Would HMA apply to them? And also don't abuse their previous spouses' rights by not having any previous spouses? I am sure someone would go down this route if the proposed amendment is incorporated in HMA. Would be interesting to see court's interpretation of the law in that case.
PS: I tried to find the entire Vilayat Raj judgment, but couldn't. Do you have it?