Inside The Harem, 13 October 2004

PROGRAMME ONE - Polygamy, the positives

"I clearly felt that what attracted him to me, was things he couldn't find with her. Not saying anything negative about her - just in general. In my opinion you can never be a perfect fit, so I didn't feel that I was marrying somebody else's husband. I think he's got the energy for ten..." "That's 30 or 40% of the male population is at some point polygamous - in other words is having a bit on the side or he's dating two girls simultaneously. This is very common - becoming more common. It's not whether men should suddenly become polygamous or not because that's already happening." "The Qur'an says that yes a man can marry 2 or 3 or 4 but if he cannot be equal and if he doesn't have the means then he should marry only one. So I believe that monogamy is the rule and polygamy is the exception to the rule." S: My name is Shagufta Yaqub. Polygamy is something I'd never really thought about until one day I got a phone-call from a woman looking for a second wife for her husband. I used to edit a British Muslim magazine and the woman had phoned to say she wanted to place an advert for a co-wife. She told me how she knew her husband's taste better than anybody else and wanted to make sure he married someone she could get along with. Although polygamy is illegal under British law, it is allowed under Islamic law, and when I got married two years ago I thought very carefully about what to include in my marriage contract. I insisted on the right to continue my education and the right to initiative a divorce, but the question of polygamy was more difficult to resolve. Should I insist that my husband will never take another wife? In the end I decided to leave the possibility open. If God has allowed polygamy, I thought who am I to challenge it? And whilst I know I could not handle such a situation myself perhaps polygamy is not as strange or uncommon as I think it is? This very personal journey has taken me throughout the UK and also to the place of my birth, Pakistan. It started in Cambridge where I wanted to find out what role the harem had in traditional Islamic societies.

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