The Supreme Court on Monday decided to personally interact with a Muslim girl who has claimed the right to marry on reaching puberty, and asked the Uttar Pradesh government to produce her along with her husband and father on October 1.

The girl, aged about 16 and recently married, has argued that Muslim personal law allows her to marry at puberty and she is therefore not bound by the general law that says a woman cannot marry till she turns 18.

After the girl married an adult, Javed, on June 22 against her family’s wishes, her father had lodged a police complaint of kidnapping and a judicial magistrate had sent her to the custody of the district child welfare committee.

Allahabad High Court rejected the couple’s petition, which argued her detention at the Nari Niketan in Ayodhya was illegal, and ruled the girl was a juvenile and therefore her marriage was void.

Javed and the girl then pettioned the apex court through advocate Dushyant Parashar.

On Monday, the bench of Justices N.V. Ramana, Sanjiv Khanna and Krishna Murari passed the directions to the Uttar Pradesh home secretary, who was personally present in compliance with the court’s September 19 directive.

The court had sought the home secretary’s presence out of annoyance at the state’s failure to file its response to the girl’s plea.

The court had directed the state government and the Nari Niketan superintendent to file their responses to her petition. But neither has done so yet. The state has so far sought three adjournments.