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Yami Gautam’s Haq: Shah Bano told her husband, ‘If I go to court, you will never wear your black coat again’, he lost and stopped practicing law

Yami Gautam-starrer Haq is based on the 1985 landmark case of Shah Bano and Mohd Ahmed Khan.

Yami Gautam in a still from Haq, based on Shah Bano case.

Yami Gautam and Emraan Hashmi-starrer Haq, which is inspired by the Shah Bano case of 1985, has been receiving positive reviews since its release. The film has Yami playing a woman named Shazia Bano who is fighting against her husband Abbas Khan, played by Emraan. The real-life Shah Bano case, which unfolded in 1985, and changed the Indian political landscape, was the story of a family from Indore where the woman, aged 62, was asked to leave her marital home, along with her children. Her husband, Mohd Ahmed Khan, later divorced her, and refused to pay her any monetary maintenance. Shah Bano challenged this, and decided to move to court.

Years later, in 2016, her daughter Siddiqua Ahmed, shared with The Indian Express that her late mother was a “simple woman” but her circumstances made her “tough.” She recalled her mother’s anger and shared, “She was so angry with my father that she warned him, ‘Vakil saab, if I go to court, you will never be able to wear your black coat again’. He lost the case and never wore his coat again.” She added that he saw it as an insult, and thus stopped practicing law altogether.

Ahmed married his second wife after he had been married to Shah Bano for 14 years. For decades, the two wives and their children lived in the same house. Until one day, when Ahmed asked Shah Bano to move into a shanty, which was also owned by him. He later divorced her and while he gave her a measly sum and even those those payments stopped eventually. Ahmed had a law degree from Bahrain and he practiced law in High Court and Supreme Court.

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In the 2016 interview, Siddiqua said that she and her sister Fatima were already married when her mother was asked to move out. She added that once the court case began, Ahmed stopped speaking to any of his children from Shah Bano. “We once met at a funeral but did not speak. He was a good man but was under the influence of my stepmother. She would mistreat my mother and brothers,” she said.

Shah Bano died in 1992 but the impact of the legal proceedings changed the political situation of the country as the then PM Rajiv Gandhi asked her to stand her ground against all religious bodies, which proved to be quite difficult for the family. The apex court ruled in her favour. But, following protests by Muslim organisations, the government enacted the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act in 1986. This law nullified Supreme Court’s decision in the Shah Bano case.

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