Consent comes first.

The Supreme Court of India hinted on Monday that it may rule that a woman has a right to choose her spouse, in a case that has gripped India for weeks. 

The court said in an observation that the “consent of an adult for marriage is prime,” Al Jazeera reported.

The case has been in the spotlight for six months, since a lower court ruled in May that the father of a 24-year-old Hindu woman named Hadiya could have her marriage to a Muslim man annulled, despite her not giving any indication that she was coerced into the union. 

That decision sparked an outcry from women’s rights’ advocates, arguing that a woman’s father shouldn’t be able to interfere with what appears to be a consensual marriage between two adults. 

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Hadiya was born Akhila Ashokan and raised Hindu, but changed her name when she converted to Islam; in 2016, she married Shafin Jahan, who is also Muslim, according to Al Jazeera. 

When Hadiya’s father, KM Ashokan, learned of Hadiya’s marriage, he petitioned the Kerala High Court to annul his daughter’s marriage and argued that Hadiya had been forced to convert to Islam and that she had not married of her own free will, Al Jazeera reported.

But Hadiya had made no such claims. 

The High Court ruled in her father’s favor, annulling the marriage and forcing Hadiya to return to her parents’ home, where she has remained under careful watch since May, according to the Guardian.

The High Court argued that Hadiya was “weak and vulnerable, capable of being exploited in many ways” and that “her marriage being the most important decision in her life, can also be taken only with the active involvement of her parents,” the Guardian reported.

The case was then escalated to the India Supreme Court.

Women’s rights activists have been vocal about their dismay at the lower court’s ruling.

“She is an adult woman, she has to be treated as such," a Supreme Court lawyer and women's rights activist, Vrinda Grover, said.

On Monday, the Supreme Court reviewed a petition from Hadiya’s husband Jahan, which called the High Court’s order an "insult to the independence of the women of India as it completely takes away their right to think for themselves." 

The Supreme Court’s observation that an adult’s consent to their own marriage should come first was welcomed by rights activists.

Read more: This Child Bride Used Facebook Posts to Get Her Marriage Annulled

Karuna Nundy, another Supreme Court lawyer similarly told Al Jazeera that, "When an adult woman, even if she marries a convicted terrorist, that is her right. The Kerala High Court's annulment of her marriage [was] wholly without jurisdiction.”

The Supreme Court has ordered that Hadiya be present at the next hearing of her case. The court is simultaneously conducting an investigation into whether or not Hadiya’s marriage was part of a “Love Jihad” — a term used by some right-wing Hindu groups to describe what they believe to be the practice of coercing Hindu girls into converting to Islam.

The court’s statement on Monday supports Hadiya’s right to choose who she marries as an adult woman. But Hadiya will remain at her parents house until her next hearing, which activists have called an “illegal house arrest” and a deprivation of her personal liberty, the Guardian reported.

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