Is The Nikah Solemnized Under Threat Of Parents Or Other Guardians Valid?

Is the nikah solemnized under threat of parents or other guardians valid?

It is a correct and necessary behavior for parents to strive to ensure their children’s establishment of a happy family in their future lives. However, parents also should respect the reasonable wishes and free will of the young people who are going to marry. Because nikah is a contract that will be concluded by the people who are going to marry with their own free will.

Although it is permissible in some madhhabs for guardians to marry the girls, who never married before, by force, as marriage is based on the principle of spouses’ living together for a lifetime and bearing the good and bad sides of life together, a nikah that is concluded without mutual consent of the people who are going to get married is not valid (Marghinani, Hidayah, III, 31-33; Mawsili, Ikhtiyar, III, 67; Aliyy al-Qari, Fath Bab al-‘Inayah, II, 32).

Source: Presidency Of Religious Affairs The Turkey, High Board of Religious Affairs FATWA