Mumbai : The State government is mulling to form a separate Buddhist Marriage Act, the draft of which will be ready before May 31, a senior official from the social justice department have said.
“The proposal for a separate Buddhist Marriage Act was first brought out by former cabinet minister Nitin Raut in 2007. This proposal was made after the Nagpur court deemed the marriage of a Buddhist couple as invalid as the marriage was performed with Buddhist rituals and there was no specific Marriage Act for the comm-unity,” the official said. Follow-ing the proposal, a committee was appointed in the same year, he said.
“The SC/ST commission chairman found some discrepancies in the proposal of Nitin Raut and he then made a fresh proposal. This proposal was discussed by the committee two days back and another meeting is to be held on the 7th of this month,” the official said. He said that the proposal will then be finalised by the committee, and will subsequently be put before the general public on the social welfare department’s website for suggestions and objections.