SHARIA LONDON

'Back-room' councils which rule on Muslim marriages have been accused of misogyny and exploiting religious freedoms-and they are on the rise on the capital.

-  David James Smith reports

A mid a small, multi-faith enclave on a residential street in Leyton, the Islamic Sharia Council sits modestly on the corner, opposite the Christian church and the Sikh temple. It's in a simple terraced building, clearly marked on the side with its name in large white capitals.

The council betrays its origins as an end-ofterrace house. Inside, the founder's daughter Khola Hasan poses patiently for our photographs, her face framed by an elegant patterned headscarf and glasses. Hasan, who is herself an Islamic scholar, with two degrees and shelves of Arabic texts on Islamic law, laughs when I ask about the glass-fronted poster on the wall in reception which offers a complicated looking visual flow chart showing a guide to Islamic divorce. "It's been there for many years", she says. "We keep meaning to update it. But it is still largely accurate." Hasan's organisation is one of around five such councils in London. Recently, it was stated in the press that there were now so many operating in Britain that we had become "the sharia court capital of the West". These councils exist primarily, they say, to deal with women stuck in marriages they cannot escape. Some argue that the councils help disenfranchised women in abusive marriages, others say it's a shadowy backstreet misogynistic world where women are cast away without any of the rights an official marriage would bestow.

A new study on the councils' work includes the story of Faria, from east London. More than seven years ago, Faria's husband deserted her.