Assalamu alaikum viewers of Imam Hussain TV, first of all I'd like to give condolences on the shahadah of the Fatima Zahra, assalamu alaikum to all viewers all over the world. Tonight's topic is simply put as Islamic divorce, often we hear of very sad cases someone's best friend, a sister, a brother, an uncle or an aunt, young or old, who actually have to endure a painful time in their life by undergoing through divorce. Certain people feel and may actually encounter injustices. However tonight let's actually look into this subject and a topic that we'll have to actually explore in some depth today and inshallah maybe next week and also the following week. With me tonight I'm glad to have also on the show Dr. Syed Ahmad Naqshwani, assalamu alaikum to all of you. It's a privilege once again to have you here. Thank you, thank you so much. Actually a very very deep and hopefully a meaningful topic, inshallah with your expertise and your knowledge and wisdom you can inshallah impart a lot of advice inshallah to viewers because this is a topic that is surrounding everyone in every community locally and internationally. So without further ado I'd like to just start off as it were just by briefly perhaps if you can shed light on the underlying tones as it were or the issues inevitably that lead to a divorce in our marriage system. What could they be and what you know what encounters that people actually experience? This no doubt is one of the most sensitive topics to discuss and I think anybody who's been involved in a divorce will realize the sensitivities involved. There are many who have been in traumatic experiences and in no way whatsoever tonight do we mean to judge anyone or do we mean to belittle what people have gone through and that's why this is going to be the first in a number of parts on understanding the social historical as well as legal repercussions of divorce within the religion of Islam because in the forthcoming parts we'll also look at what happens after the divorce what's happening with custody what's happening in terms of finances what's happening with family relations and so on so that will be coming in the forthcoming part but you notice clearly from the outset that the religion of Islam in contrast to other religions which may not have allowed divorce to take place rather other religions such as Christianity may have spoken about an annulment of a marriage rather than divorce but the religion of Islam recognize that these two who may have come from completely different backgrounds there is a possibility that things may go wrong as well as there's a possibility that you may have Khadija and Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa ala and Fatima and Amir al-Mu'mineen alaihi wa sallam so when the religion of Islam was quite practical on this front in allowing a divorce to take place and hence within the holy Quran there are not only discussions of Talaq and for example chapters such as chapter 2 of the holy Quran for example from verse 2 to 8 to 231 or for example chapter 66 of the holy Quran but there's actually a surah called Talaq and if you were to ask many Muslims in the world today have you read the surah that is actually titled divorce I don't think there are many who even knew there was a surah called Talaq when you're bringing these chapters together what you have is a general legal as well as a historical understanding of what's taking place in the nascent Muslim community in terms of marriage and relations as a whole and how the reality is that since the beginning or the onset of the religion of Islam until today the gender that has been the most oppressed when it comes to divorce either by culture or by certain I would even say legal statutes and principles which have been given to us and mainly patriarchal societies is the female yeah there are sadly many cases in the Muslim world where females are oppressed where their lives have been destroyed where any complaint that they even tried to make about the abuse that they received fell on deaf ears and I do hope that tonight we do something revolutionary inshallah in the Muslim world and humanitarian as well and that is to try and speak not only on scenarios where divorce can take place but also on rethinking in the forthcoming parts as well the rights of divorce when somebody is going through a very difficult and turbulent relationship yes this is something quite innovative because either to this point the whole idea of divorce is husband has a right to divorce you you as the lady have no right and if you do have a right you're gonna have to give everything away that you have and get on with your life yeah possibly ridiculed and that's for the fortunate few who have parents who may support them getting divorced there are those out there who don't have the background the basis the parents to be able to move on in their life but then we have to balance this with the traditions that are normally thrown at us right in the annals of Islamic history traditions such as the Arsh of God shakes when it takes place or that the you know the halal which is the worst of them and the eyes of God is is divorce and so when you see these traditions you're then stuck that on the one hand the Lord while allowing divorce looks at it in a way which is seen as being frowned upon frowned upon yeah and then of course that the male dominates and the male looks at and says well you know I don't mind such narrations because they suit me because I have to give you the divorce for you to get out of this relationship and if I don't want to give you divorce I will make you go through hell yeah and so there's a number of issues which I'm sure we'll come to sure thank you for that breakdown in the West a number of marriages outside of Islam but let's just make it balanced now in Islam can there be a prenuptial agreement in the Nica prior to the Nica as it were a prenuptial agreement if a person decides on a prenup for example the lady decides in the prenup that she wants to have the right of divorce this can be done it can you can have a prenup agreement as well that your husband cannot be in another relationship without asking for your permission right so the prenup it's up to the couple if you two for example are an engaged couple okay and you decide that there are certain areas you want to agree on beforehand we see the prenups occurring in many parts and many communities in the world today generally it's not just Islamic especially if you're a billionaire you're always trying to look after the prenups and sometimes you even see these Hollywood actors protecting assets as an actress is absolutely right they protect their assets because they're thinking if we're gonna break up you can't have access to my house in Manhattan you can't have access to my house in Beverly Hills or in Paris or in London so they make these prenups so likewise Islamically speaking before a couple decide that they want to get married they could also have a prenup right and that prenup will entitle for example the lady will say that I want you know the unilateral right to divorce okay which normally is associated for the men yeah Islamically that lady can say well before that I want to make sure that I have that as well okay and just continuing on from the prenup to agreement is it advised to have it actually how what it what is the well the thing is I wouldn't necessarily say there's traditions that are speaking about the estihaab of having a prenup yeah and I would say on a practical level if from the outset for example you have somebody telling her fiance that listen I want a prenup now I've got the right to divorce then already the relationship is quite you know it's quite a rocky start to the relationship okay because I think as soon as someone hears that you know you hope that you're gonna live with each other sickness and health good times and bad and so on mm-hmm and then all of a sudden you're told well have you put down that I can divorce at any time now sometimes I could see where those ladies may be coming from because they've seen their mom in a very abusive relationship let's say yeah seen the the father beat the mother black and blue and when that happens you'll have that situation where she's thinking hold on a minute I don't ever want to be in that predicament no where dad has literally told mom what are you gonna do about this even if I am gonna beat you your family are not gonna let you get divorced the helpless the community will frown upon you and there are certain countries in the Muslim world where divorce is a nightmare you know if you look for example I'd say if you're looking in Iraq for example or you're looking in Pakistan for example divorce can be an absolute nightmare because it really is the end of the world for the ladies and some of those societies and the men know it men know that the legal system works in our favor mm-hmm I am the man and I have a right for divorce and now if I'm not giving you the divorce and you're telling me you're unhappy what you're gonna do about it yeah the assets in many cases are in my name it's a tribal society in many cases where the male dominates right and so when a person hears about this you cannot blame some of our you know younger sisters who are looking to get married you can't blame them when they turn around to you and say that listen I want a prenup yeah now that likewise works with the with the with the ones who are saying to their husbands that I want a prenup that you will not be with anyone else while we're married okay now I know that this may devastate some guys who are you know who are enjoying what they're enjoying on the side the reality of it is is quite clear everywhere irrespective of your religiosity or your religious standing you may find that there are people risk religious or non-religious who may have a reasonable side yeah now someone might see that and say well I want to put that down the prenup if it's down in the prenup it's like a contractual agreement yes yes and you know those contracts are binding yeah that's it can't turn around say well I I have my own worldview and that prenup doesn't apply to me if you two have decided on this then you have to go ahead with this yeah you have to go ahead so right I personally remember being involved in a case a few years ago where I didn't recommend okay that sister in our community impose one to impose this in the prenup because I said don't judge every guy by what your father did to your mom that person who's coming to house or doesn't deserve to be frowned upon because what can also happen is that when I know that this is in the prenup anything that I sniff where there's just a hint that there may have been a relationship a hint I have the right for divorce yeah and therefore when I have this right I may end up I wouldn't say the word is abusing it but it may lead me to even investigating further and saying that you know what can I losing trust and so on and being suspect being even that he's spoken of in the holocaust yeah okay thank you for that we've already got questions coming in viewers so one question is from Copenhagen Fatima so she hasn't really alluded to her spouse's name so they've been engaged but does the engagement as it were count as a real Nica or is the Nica actually part of the actual ceremony itself well we've been because in the West yeah let's be let's be frank that's it yeah in today's world irrespective of what culture you come from Indian Pakistani Iraqi Iranian some cultures insist in having a engagement yeah and some would say no engagement it's not for us and we would just go for the Nica so if you can just probably just put it out there as it were the engagement and the Nica when it comes to the engagement we're used to this in the in the Western world yeah that someone says who is this say oh this my fiancee for example yeah and they say that we're engaged what that engagement means is that we're together and there's a marriage to look forward to in the future yes Muslims recognize that you cannot just be in any relationship even if you know you're gonna marry that person without there being a contract absolutely but some Muslims out there face a predicament he as the father-in-law has just accepted this boy to marry his daughter yeah but the wedding will take place in another nine months so what do they do they get engaged in that period when they're engaged some decide to have the Nica or the akad or the cat Biktaab in that period right right yes the problem with that remember the wedding's about nine months away yeah yeah in the eyes of everybody you're engaged in the eyes of God you're married and that means if a month later you're engaged you're not living together when a month later you decide that this isn't for you then Tala divorce has to be pronounced right the community doesn't forgive no and so the community when they look at this why they're gonna say say this person is a divorcee yeah the person's never lived with a girl the person and this girl have never lived under one roof together yeah but because we've decided that an akad takes place what we end up with is a situation where you have somebody divorced who has never even had a wedding mm-hmm so someone says what's the solution solution for example someone can be involved in a muta yeah now I know whenever we say the word muta straight away you've got people eyebrows raised frowning in some cases yeah because they grew up with this understanding muta is when a man who's married is just playing on the side with a temporary relationship whereas no on the contrary no the temporary relationship practiced in the time of the Holy Prophet peace be upon his family by his companions now annuled prohibited who did it we leave that for another day exactly the fact is that he allowed this temporary marriage the Shi'a call it muta others then would have other terms for their relationships different from what was normally seen as the as the for example the Nika they were someone say off in Missy and I know that many have their legal debates but if your daughter is now engaged now obviously her and her fiance want to go out with each other yeah can't just go out because they're going to get married in nine months no no you necessarily want to do the cat big taba Nika because you know that there will be if they break up a talaq even though there's no wedding done yet because they've done a haqid so the muta can be done the muta what happens in that muta the father for example can set the conditions as to how much they can interact yes absolutely the father can say that I allow you to for example to go out with each other because I don't want the community looking at the two of you and me being in you know having a sort of losing my reputation as he was exactly so we do this in the proper way yeah so I want you two to be together and I want this all done in the proper way and the father can say that for example you can be together and physically that guy might want to hug his miss you know and that guy might want to kiss his miss sure and that person may want to hold the hands of his miss yes but the father says that listen anything further than that I'm not allowing yeah so when the father says this he can make this condition and they agree a dowry and a great time period yes because they may have come to a conclusion that the wedding will take place let's say in December the family have accepted the boy in January so there's still 11 months left until the marriage and so because of that in those 11 months the father can stipulate okay and when the father has stipulated this then this is a proper engagement what happens if the two of them break up so if the two of them break up they are broken engagement yes there's no harm there's no because there's no act I don't know cat picked up done in the sense of the permanent marriage and also if I can add as well you actually mentioned it indirectly but just for the sake of viewers what I does not have to be sexual it can just be for you to be interacted in a halal way as it were subject to permission of the father if the ladies are a virgin so that also in itself is I think sometimes misinterpreted sure we've got another question and this question is also from abroad Ali and Sakina they just let me just paraphrase what they've actually mentioned they've had the nikka pronounced but also engaged so that also that scenario is also thrown in there but they haven't consummated the marriage due to whatever reason is there an iddah period there is no addah if the two of you have been involved in the temporary marriage and the permanent marriage right okay okay so you've got let's say someone who's in the time of marriage someone who's been involved permanent marriage while there has not been consummation then there is no addah period okay okay viewers do call in for questions as well the telephone numbers 0203 515019 you can also text or WhatsApp your questions on 4407 939 917163 once again what's out 4407 939 917163 so you know just to continuing on there's some questions that are coming in indirectly and they've actually been waiting as it were the there's a sister and she mentioned about marrying a man previously but found out later on after a duration that he was impotent is this a qualifying factor for divorce and just before you answer that do they just break up what what goes on around that scenario yeah this devastating situation for anyone and there are sadly ladies out there who have even spent I remember a case where there was a lady involved in a marriage she was involved with a person six years six years he had not consummated the marriage now that is probably the most patient human being even Prophet Ayyub will testify to her patients because that is absolutely phenomenal how you're able to be with somebody who for six years there's no consummation there are others at the moment would be together for a year no consummation there are others who may have been together for two weeks no consummation now each one is different right and we have to make a principle point jurisprudentially from the outset okay and that is is this person aware of their impotency you married someone yeah that person is aware of their impotency or no right if the person is aware of their impotency and deceived you hmm it's different from the one who may be going through turbulent stressful time let's see the difference between the two there's someone out there they've been involved in a marriage and that marriage they were involved in they knew very well they had for example erectile dysfunction they knew very well that there was problems where they were told that they could never have kids and so on all that person knew very well that even being aroused by the opposite gender was a problem there are people who will say to you that I couldn't I don't just don't have it in me yes that when I'm with somebody in the bedroom when we take off our clothing I find it disgusting I find it difficult yeah they may even want the light switched off and so on so when this happens that person is fully aware right sometimes sadly in our communities what happens is even though the family know this person had an impotency issue in their marriage they let that person marry somebody else without informing the poor girl that this person for example has erectile issues this person finds it difficult to get aroused and so on yes yes and that is oppression and that type of person the moment you realize there's this issue an old marriage divorce takes place I see that's a different situation because that person is aware of their impotency okay and just just before you continue so you say now what is it just a brief definition of annulment and divorce well you normally what you would have is when a divorce is about to take place divorce what does it mean when you see a talaq and the Arabic language you look at the dictionary part not something that was shackled and now is freed okay okay something that was locked and now is to be freed I see so when the Arabs would talk about the camel and the word divorce or talaq in relation to the camel right the camel is tied up okay and then when the talaq is done that camel is free to go and roam okay rather than being tied up right this dunya for example is something that shackles us right yes this dunya can capture us when imam alaylulam ta'ala says I've divorced you a three point divorce of which there is no return it's not just a matter of I am now untied but now I'm broken away from you yeah I'm free to reach the heights which you were trying to stop in some cases okay so now when we're coming to annulment annulment is not something that's gonna require what the divorce is gonna divorce is gonna require what we're gonna need those two witnesses yes the two arbiters right correct correct we're going to need all of that to come together we're gonna need maybe a period of separation we're gonna need all of these areas to come together annulment happens the moment for example you have realized that there is an impotency issue okay no need to go to Moana Saab and sit with Moana what's your opinion what's my opinion what do we do what did she say what did he say come back to me no no when a person is impotent yes and they were aware of their impotency annulment takes place now let's look at the other way if you have a case where you're not aware of your of an impotency okay yeah you may be someone who for example either knows of their sexual prowess right yeah or you may be somebody who is a virgin mm-hmm and their innocence yes but is never known of themselves to be in any spot of difficulty and so on a couple of weeks into the marriage that person's finding extreme difficult mm-hmm difficult why they may be stressed in their lives yeah sure there may be a certain there's even peer pressures yeah that for example in some communities they will actually joke with you tonight and this is and sometimes these types of jokes in some cases are very sad yeah insulting and in some cases aren't showing a respect to that person's feelings with their partner true some companies even ask for the cloth to see if the girl has is still in her innocence yes now imagine that pressure that's there because I don't think many people realize that also when you when you consummate a marriage with someone who's still in their innocence blood doesn't necessarily have to come no okay and so there's some people who are under pressure and that's impression mm-hmm so you're tired in your wedding day and you're not able to consummate this relationship a week later you're not able to consummate this relationship you move on a month later you're not able to consummate in that stage we advise that the person resorts to counseling right resorts to those people who are specialists maybe even take a time out with your partner yes to reflect on a different environment to where you are mm-hmm okay yeah so when you're looking at all of these in that case is that impotency leading to a divorce no because in that case that person himself is telling you that I am not aware of this right now you too may decide that this rate is really causing harm to your relationship because I don't think there's any lady out there who's watching the show who wants to be the one who's in a relationship where her husband does not find strength when looking at her yeah in their peak for it right you know yeah I listen there may be people now who may be in their 50s and may need the help of certain pharmaceutical pharmacy drug dealers to provide them with a couple of tablets to help them gain their strength yeah yeah sure but then there may be those in their 20s and you're wondering what's going on you're in your 20s you're at your peak what what why is this happening but I think in those cases to hold on to your partner to support them in this difficult time is the noble act is the noble act now when I hear stories of those six years for example yeah that's a difficult one to compare sometimes yeah when you have somebody's been in a relationship six years and they're finding extremely difficult this is something to in some cases praiseworthy and then it's completely up to them of course course I'm doing a lot we've had another message as a question fortunately a sad occurrence a sister she didn't want to give her name but she married someone in Islam being Muslim herself yeah fell in love the husband changed as it were and then stop believing in Islam as it were now is she stuck in that marriage what rights does she have to divorce him or not can their marriage be an old apostasy in Islam is one of the ways or one of the conditions for a marriage which can be annulled right away however I may see it as a reflection of the example and we may relate to the example of impotency right right I get married to somebody who's on shaky ground in terms of some of their religious beliefs okay and I really don't mind if somebody questions the theological tenants of the religion of Islam I don't have a problem with it no anything done with respect is fine yeah if I get married to somebody who really I in the engagement period I should have sussed out that they were certain you know it should have sussed out that when you're having these discussions in the engagement period try and discuss the things that really matter you know discuss the opinions on on your closeness to God on the love of God on how you want to build the family and the spiritual life some will suss out the engagement but let's say that a week into the marriage you two are on your honeymoon and you're seeing on that beach in the Maldives which I suppose is the archetypal place where you know people and you probably are not really going to be thinking about Islamic theology too much but let's say you're sitting having your dinner and the person you're with turns around to you and saves to you you know what I I don't really believe that the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him his family was infallible I think his life for example he that person might turn around so I think his life you know is a life where mistakes may have happened when that is said is that necessarily an act of apostasy at that moment not necessarily because that person might turn around say listen I respect the Prophet peace be upon his family and I believe he's the final prophet of God but I just believe there were a couple of occasions where a mistake may have happened that person's not an apostate why do I say that because there are many Muslims who believe that but they're not apostates there are Muslims out there in the world who believe that yeah Satan may have affected the Prophet peace be upon his family but God rectified the situation in the famous book that came out later on called the Satanic verses was based on on those verses in Sura 53 of the Quran so there are Muslims in the world who believe that the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon his family made mistakes but we don't call them apostates no we say that these are part of the at the miller they're part of the umma of the religion of Islam then there are others out there who for example maybe your your husband turns around to and says you know what you say we can't see God I believe in a God who we can see and he's got hands and he's got feet and he's got a beard and he's sitting on a throne and I don't care what Shi'i theology says I believe that every single verse that mentions Korsi or that mentions a hash or that mentions Yed or that mentions Ain is literal yeah yeah whenever I say that again I have they become a more Ted have they apostatized no they haven't that person may be somebody who believes what a lot of Muslims in the world today believe yeah that God literally sits on a throne with the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon his family next to him on the day of judgment and that God has a beard and that God has a shin and that God when he wants to put his feet into hell and so on so has the apostatized certainly differed with Shi'i theology but yeah then I may have somebody who completely says you know what all this Islam is nonsense I don't believe in any of it I don't believe in God I don't believe in the prophets I don't believe in the angels and I reject the book now at this stage this moment again there's that ones who are involved in the early days of their marriage yes and there are those who are 21 years into their marriage with three kids some of the companions of the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon his family some of the ladies were married to men who weren't interested in the religion of Islam and therefore their marriage was annulled because that person is you know a Muslim woman cannot marry a non-Muslim man yeah in the case of somebody who early in their relationship their husband has said such a thing just be a bit patient may have been a really frantic you know a crazy day he's just lost it completely yeah I said something like that yeah in the case of those who are married for 20 years as well right there's no harm taking the husband of yours at that moment say listen let's sit with said I'm not sure let's sit with say it full on check full on let's sit with somebody in the community who you can pose your theological questions true mm-hmm if after posing your theological questions to them there are still doubts and you still don't believe in this and by the way I've been involved in two cases okay okay two cases and although the wives were very adamant that their husbands stay because there's obviously love love kids involved absolutely absolutely there's a lot to lose listen the Quran says lakum dinakum waliyadeen to use your religion to me is mine for Mancha if I let me know Mancha if I like for whoever wants to believe let them believe and whoever wants to disbelieve let them disbelieve laikra if the Dean there's no compassion religion if the person has reached a conclusion that messes Dawkins and messes hitches and messes Harris are providing them with an understanding of the cosmos or something the cosmos or how all of this originates or morality or to them what they want to follow you know might come and stop it yeah but I would say don't stray away although yes in Islamic law someone who apostatizes the marriages are not right and the story okay but I think on a practical level okay there should be a case of more discussion and more dialogue and yes shukrn thank you for that so now we're gonna go for a break in the next couple of minutes just before we go for a break I do urge viewers please to call in and also donate to imam was saying TV imam was saying TV is relying on your donations throughout the world and in order for us to make good programs and good content and have great guests such as Dr. Seyed Aman Akshwani we do need actually donations to sustain this channel inshallah just food for thought so now we'll go to a break very soon there's also been another concerning case that I've heard of recently where a couple married they're clearly in love but one of them hasn't let go of the past and his part his ex as it were is still communicating with him we probably continue to solve the break but how does that leave the scenario going forward as it were if they're already married yes and we may need to break you there sure sure sure we'll answer that directly after the break yeah is that the best yeah I think I think so let's come back to the next break inshallah so see you again inshallah salam aleykum and welcome back to tonight's live show where we actually discussing Islamic divorce and this topic is so deep that we shall inshallah be elaborating it in a further series next week and also subsequent weeks inshallah salam aleykum Sayyidina wa aleykum assalam dr. Marr just prior to the break we just set the tone as it were for a couple who are clearly in love but the the husband hasn't really let go of his past his ex make it easy his ex-wife is still in contact with him and his current wife call it jealousy just clearly does not like it what what issues are potentially going to arise and what where's it's gonna what depends what level of contact we're talking about yeah yeah you know that there are different levels of contact there is somebody who who maintains you know a relationship of respect with let's say their ex-wife it could be a situation where you know you and your ex-wife have kids together right you can't just all of a sudden expect the husband to abandon any communication however if the wife does for example see certain messages yeah where you know the person is speaking to their ex-wife in a way which can lead on to something which could damage the relationship then the wife has every right to speak right you can't move on and marry somebody while you still entertain thoughts of being with somebody else at that time yeah otherwise just be blatant about it from the beginning of course there are certain people who enter marriages and they should just from the outset say that look I have feelings for somebody else but I'm gonna try and make this work so that person on the other side knows that listen if you've got feelings for someone else let's not go ahead with this yeah however there are some also it requires a bit of patience with them as well true that they they not necessarily gonna do anything wrong even if they have a communication with somebody who's in there in there in their past or in there you know in their history and I don't think a person should be too rash at that moment right should be open communication between the two okay okay we've got a case with a sister but all and she said that I live abroad and she doesn't want to give any further details however she's living with the indoors and she's actually mentioned that she's forced to wake up approximately 4 a.m. when her dear father-in-law also wakes up and requests for breakfast to be made and she's um that's crazy she's actually alluded to the fact that it's becoming a bit of a nightmare and you know it's she's still newlywed but she feels like a slave and yeah she's got every right to say that I don't know there are some people out there who marry girls to become slaves for their parents clearly that's absolutely ridiculous not not part of the teachings of the religion of Islam at all you know I see it change now but there are many out there who force their wives to literally cook clean everything for the in-laws now before the marriage I think if you do not make it clear that you are not necessarily one who wants to live with the in-laws then sadly this situation is a possibility but when you hear that there are ladies newlyweds who have to wake up when their father-in-law wakes up to go and make them breakfast I can imagine this don't get me wrong I can imagine this in 1921 in a village in India I can imagine this in a village let's say in a part of Iraq somewhere but it still goes on when I'm being told that this still goes on and the father and the mother-in-law believe that they have this right yeah that you have come into our house you clear this table you clear the house you clean the house when we wake up breakfast should be ready I personally think that this is absolutely ridiculous and I believe that there are a lot of Muslim men out there who know that when their wife lives with the in-laws they can do what they want yeah treat her as bad as they want and the moment she starts to just say that look for example I slept last night late and your dad wants me to be up in a couple of hours you want me to be with you when I'm sleeping this late what do you want me to do and they will tell her listen either you behave or I'll kick you out yeah and there are many Muslim men out there and that's why I always said religiosity is not in the length of your prayer or the fast as you know the imams would say religiosity comes in the way a person's morals are the way they behave with others and if you're somebody who's behaving with your wife in this way yes then as the Holy Prophet peace be upon his family made it clear the best of you is the best to their family and I'm the best with my family hundred when have you ever in your life read a narration from any of the imams where they made their wife get up and cook for their families where they made their wife get up and cook for the in-laws where they force their wives to live with their in-laws where is this from if you're telling me in India your family has been doing it for a hundred years in Pakistan you wanted to continue the trend yeah and some will say look the houses that we live in it helps yes there are people who live in mansions you know seven eight ten bedroom houses where you can have your separate quarters and live with the in-laws I can appreciate yeah yeah yeah yeah but then there are others who will cram their in-laws like the daughter-in-laws with the sons and you may have them all living in the same house yes now don't get me wrong it can work but can also lead to a lot of oppression of course so poor but told the one who's asking this question when she's saying that 4 a.m. she has to be waking up to make breakfast for her father-in-law a father-in-law go get yourself a maid yeah yeah there's many maids out there sure there are agencies let me just advise maybe people don't know there are agencies where you can go get a maid that girl that you took from the person's house you've not taken somebody to be your slave no and if you find that you are now in your 60s and your 70s and you can't move around as much therefore that daughter-in-law got everything for you no that's not Islamic no no it's not you're in your 60s and 70s and if you're gonna become a burden on somebody I know that this is very sensitive why because it's an honor for us to look after our parents yeah true it's an honor for us to be there for our parents the way they were there for us but the same time it's abuse I cannot abuse this to destroy a girl's feelings the amount of girls who cry in the middle of the night ladies who cry in the middle of the night because of the way that they have been ridiculed and laughed at and what's the excuse but you know my dad or my mom's old your dad and your mom's old is not an excuse for you to oppress this girl yes absolutely so then when this girl wants a divorce which I don't necessarily recommend because your husband is still somebody you love and I'm sure this can be worked out but moment ago as a divorce what is the community say you know how bad she is you see these modern girls what do you want to girls it's modern girls ethics is ethics yeah true and I cannot be more passionate about this because I've seen so many examples in the Muslim community where we have slaves not daughter-in-law yeah thank you for that deep insight say no we've got one question via WhatsApp come through I wanted to ask you regarding a topic of divorce I had a seven months marriage during those seven months my husband was constantly believing that I was cheating on him but I wasn't he didn't want me to work forced me to stay at home and he used to beat me one day it became really hard and I went to the hospital I told my parents they made me realize that this is not a safe marriage and I asked for a divorce I am right that's a this is a question I am right can I ask him the divorce he didn't give me any of my jewelry and all that I got for our wedding and I didn't ask for it is it right that he can keep all of the material things that should belong to me this we're going to be discussing when we're going to talk about the khul'a okay and you know the mubarak and the you know the hakem ishara and so on and we're going to discuss this further yes and what it seems has taken place over here right is what's known as the khul'a divorce where you because you are the one who's initiated this therefore the dowry and maybe something extra has to be given back however right once again it places a major question mark okay on the justice in relation to giving divorce to men in Islam right I ask everybody who's watching this show show me a verse in the Quran a clear verse in the Quran with no ambiguity okay that says the right of divorce is for the husband in Islam only show me a verse I ask those out there show me a hadith that says very clearly yeah the right of divorce is only for the man in Islam when this lady seven months has been beaten black and blue yeah she has to wait for that permission who's beating her she has to wait for him no I don't get like you know I I always believe in this idea that whatever revelation reaches a conclusion on so does our intellect and whatever intellect reaches a conclusion on revelation would I also believe in intrinsic moral values and understanding of them by the human being which we discuss in Oswald al-Firk when we discuss mustaqillah at a liya right right now when we're looking at this area how is it justice we both enter a contract called marriage we're both got 50-50 partnership but you seemingly have all the decision-making skills and the other one doesn't doesn't so what is this contract then how is it binding yeah I'm not understanding I know that there are people who show I as in the Quran involving words such as and when you divorce them mm-hmm when he divorced them so they'll say look the haktas with the man I wanted to show me a clear verse in the Quran if not in the world of hadith okay okay show me a clear verse or a clear hadith sorry where it says right of divorce is only with the man right and when you normally tell somebody about the right divorce for the woman they'll say well yeah you can have the khul'a divorce no no not the khul'a a woman has been beaten black and blue mm-hmm and that woman has been treated abysmally and she looks at that husband of hers and he's like the religion that you love and the religion that I love says that when I decide yeah is when you can leave this relationship can someone please explain to me how it is just now you know what reasons are normally given so someone might give a reason such as well the woman are more emotional than men I'd be emotional if someone's punching my face of course you know I'd be emotional yeah I'd be emotional if someone's kicking me at home and I can't tell my dad I'd be emotional if I'm getting kicked at home and tell my dad and my dad tells me don't tell anyone because if people find out then your daughters will not get married yeah yeah emotional I agree that I have been involved in cases where someone tells you I want to divorce him now and it was him now and you're like are you sure I want to divorce him now and it was him now I've changed my mind I don't want to watch him change my mind I do want to watch I agree okay listen the mother who God gave the ability to raise us and give birth to us with those beautiful emotions there'll be emotions in other ways as well true but is that enough for a person say that's why the men men are not emotional men are not rash yeah men do not regret a moment where they may have called for a divorce then there are others who say well men are the maintainers of woman because they therefore have to pay for everything Allah gave them the right to divorce that doesn't make sense to me right it really doesn't make sense to me what if the woman's maintaining the man yes true and it does happen there are a woman out there who if it's not for them the mortgage is not getting paid yeah it's right they earn more than some men yeah and so there needs to be a reevaluation of this area right which I'm sure we can go into further when we begin to look at the different avenues that may be used okay next you know in the next show but this whole concept that the right of divorce is for the man only in Islam and that the woman has to go from office to office Maulana to Maulana father to father mother to mother community community and still beg and you know people will say to the woman you know you're emotional I don't think she's gonna let out her frustration because she's emotional for her to have decided that she wants to leave a relationship it's not easy no yeah okay thank you for that passionate response I say thank you another message from WhatsApp now this person's actually quoted a name of an Alim and I'm intentionally not going to read the alims name I've recently been through a divorce I was married for four months my wife just paid a UK Arlim £1,000 to process her divorce no show your process was followed and I received the papers for Hula okay no reasons were provided for divorce my wife made up allegations against me which were false the Alim didn't contact didn't conduct any investigation he accepted the wife's version of events as being true no meeting no nothing I discovered she was a sec she was in a sexual relationship with a non-Muslim man and lives with him I approached the Alim and informed him he just ignored and said it would be a non-fault divorce whatever that means I had to approach a Sunni Alim to get the divorce done properly what is the seers view on such business taking places and alims or your moms as he's put conducting themselves in such a fashion you could get bad you can get good and bad in all professions and in all walks of life I think the first role of anyone in this position is that they have to hear both sides of the story because if say for example a lady has gone to a Mawlana in the community and she's asked the Mawlana for help yeah because the husband is treating her abysmally and the husband is arrogantly telling her Islam doesn't allow you unilaterally to have the right for divorce so when she's gone towards that Mawlana the Mawlana can easily for example call the Wakeel of the Marja Hakeem Shara okay may have a representative somewhere and that representative will listen to what she has to say is that the name the norm as it were yes so because what happened in the past when you're going through a very difficult time yeah your husband's not maintaining you and for example there's no sexual relations and you don't know what to do because you were told in the past that you know you as a woman is very frowned upon for you to go looking for a divorce yeah now what you have is that you can clearly go to the rep of the Marja and the rep of the Marja has a duty and that duty is to call call who called your husband right and ask him the question what's happening here likewise that Mawlana if he hears that you have treated the you have been treated badly the Mawlana should call that person there and say to him that listen there's an allegation against you okay what do we do about this allegation right talk to me okay how do we verify if you are doing something let me advise you I must admit that there are cases which are sad you know where a payment and nulls a relationship but can it can it actually happen behind the others back without them knowing no no what really has to unless that guy the only situation I can think of right she has said to the Mawlana that the person doesn't maintain her and there is no physical relations between them and the Mawlana tried his hardest to contact this person right in every which way possible not okay let me make one phone call no I couldn't get through term divorced no okay tried in every which way possible to contact him right where he could see for example that the person's read the whatsapp message two ticks blue ticks got you you know even the one where you pretend that you haven't read it and it looks great but you know you've read it and you know all the person's left voicemail and that person's not even replying in that situation the Mawlana might turn around and say well you are probably right the person's been away for so long he is not helping out he clearly is not maintaining you and the Mawlana may have been a rep of a particular merger who therefore is able to decide that this can for example be issued but this is not the way to go about things you know normally you'll be able to get through to the person right the bigger problem we face is what happens when we get through to the person and the person suddenly becomes angel jibrael right because sometimes you might get through to someone he's the worst human being but Salam Mawlana how are you how's everything how's the family tip top and you're like listen is this of course it's not true I love my wife I'm gonna be with her through thick and thin right and the moment you finish that conversation he goes and tells her what what did you try and do yeah you see you try to go behind my back I'll tell the Mawlana that's where I believe the question mark has to be opened up and raised and discussed concerning woman's right for divorce and Islam okay okay the unilateral right given to men I believe only can bring about injustice mm-hmm yeah so do you think it should be revised the question is in its origin was it ever meant to be for men only okay okay good point yeah I am no one to come and just say we revise things although in the world of Mu'malat being different from the world of Ibadat possibly there is always the question mark of a revamping or reform but I think in this particular case mm-hmm I think if you're looking for verse in the Quran and hadith I know you know you're looking at a little you know traditions which are mentioned which may be given indication for example Imam al-Baqar divorcing his wife and they say that look the fact that the Imam initiates it means the haqq of divorce is with the with with the man but his wife is a Nasa be possibly who has cursed Ali we've never thought about Islam and so she apostatizes in that moment and therefore hasn't really got anything to do with that then there are other traditions where they look at Imam asadaq and his companions questioning the rights of a wife to go ahead with a divorce and whether these traditions are to be taken in some cases as sound you know reliable or not you know there are there are interesting discussions on this area yes but I think it needs to be reassessed in the world view of justice sure in relation to a woman's right absolutely yeah thank you thank you for that we've got another question now this question ties in with another question that I was going to actually put forward to you from another person I've been married for a couple of years have no kids my ex has cheated multiple times behind my back he has also attempted sexually assault my family member sexually assault my family member your ex ex has cheated yeah yeah my ex has cheated so she's divorced him now well this is why I'm going to come back to you now my ex has cheated multiple times behind my back he has also attempted sexually assault my family member do I need do I still need him to divorce me the divorce we have been living separately for a year now so essentially in her mind you know they're living apart indefinitely but they need that piece of paper I suppose you know to say that yeah divorce proceedings but does she does he need to I don't know about his belief system I you know I clearly the person is morally not responsible enough to be in this relationship and he clearly has no relation with his wife and it's not maintaining the family they've been separated for a year this should be a formality for it to be and what can she do though she goes to the rep of the merger okay and the rep of the merger will make a call right and is it true you've been separated for a year is it true that you're not in relations with your wife you're not maintaining them okay okay yeah right another question then we'll go back to the content Salam quick question for the say it when a woman divorces and wants to remarry but she has children what is the ruling on who keeps full custody of the children what is the right of the women and men in this scenario thank you we have in the coming part of this series what happens after divorce after divorce financially children yes edda okay revocable divorce irrevocable all of this is coming inshallah inshallah but generally just to give a general answer all of these situations I will elaborate on further is that you know if you're gonna move on with another marriage normally the custody of the children age of two age of seven son daughter would go back to your ex however it's recommended that because of an attachment to the mother that they that you try and find a way in which they stay with the mother I'll elaborate on that in the fourth okay inshallah inshallah so about 15 minutes ago you passionately put forward I must say you know some positive light in terms of the sister who was actually getting up for him and she was treated like a slave and you know it just doesn't cut it as it were similarly we've had another sister who's contacted us and she's in love with her husband they're very close but there's been interference the stereotypical interference as it were for the husband's parents she can't cope and she's descended into somewhat depression as it were and also starting to harm herself which is very sad the husband is totally and oblivious and she even hides it from him can she separate for a time and if you can possibly just shed some light on this separation is it recommended at all and so and so if we just start just backtrack a little bit can she separate for a time first of all a separation can be done at any time and what sort of separation is that in terms of parallel to Islamic living yes you're still you're still in a relation with each other physically still be intimate with each other okay but you may have to be yes sorry I have to be into the rights are still there right there is no such thing as I'm separated from you and therefore I don't want to get close to you probably understand that is a delicate moment where you don't want necessarily stress on these things right because you have other areas which you feel are more important that need to be resolved obviously physically speaking you sound like you're okay yeah but there's other areas that need to be resolved sure so is it just having a timeout a timeout and I think it's understandable rather than straight away saying divorce see if there is a timeout period okay well maybe you can you know have if you look Quranically mm-hmm God talks of for example arbiters coming in yeah yeah an arbiter from one side and I would have another yeah these arbiters could be a Maulana could be wise men of the community they have a role in seeking to provide you with guidance or you may say for example Maulana or you may say to an uncle of yours who's the elder of the family that this person his parents the way they're treating me has made our relationship become bad yeah and I do feel sorry for some guys where they have to balance that in laws and the wife relationship and so on the elder of your family when the Quran is saying bring the arbiters bring somebody of respect who can put a word in that look if you two love each other and you as a family are respectable family don't let it descend into this remember it's not obligatory for a girl to live with her husband's parents respecting husband's parents respect like any person in this world you have to show tolerance you have to show morals true but there's no such thing as I have to give your dad a cup of tea when he wants yeah yeah my humility my love for you my respect for your for the foundation of our children's grandparents you know that comes into it however you can move out with your wife the problem is some of the parents are troubles true why have you moved out why have you become like these modern families it's not about modern family my wife has to walk around the house naked she can't if dad's always around and sing yeah yeah my there are some believe you mean they live in a house believe you mean where sometimes the in-laws dictate when the two of them can be together yeah there are some who the in-laws knock on the wall stop making noise what we stop making noise what are we doing gonna live through our just like they say yeah when we go to sleep we read the book when we're sleeping next to each other of course there's gonna be some noise made yeah and this is cause so many divorces unnecessarily like she said I love my husband mm-hmm but my husband is reaching a situation now where he's saying look these are my parents and the more you know the people in my position more lines we always mention heaven is underneath a few of the mothers wasn't purchased the king well you know what my mother's this my father's this but my wife is this now what do I do yes yeah okay okay so so separation is jai's as it were allowed there's another one here which I'm just going to try and read out very quickly because I think we've just got about just under 10 minutes two questions I've been married for eight years me and my husband can't have children together because he has a problem and there is no treatment do I have a right to ask for divorce second question if I decided to have a child and stay with my husband the other options is to get anonymous sperm donor and have kids is this okay in Islam so yeah first question mm-hmm right to ask for divorce yeah you've got a right to ask for a divorce there's no doubt whatsoever okay and I think the most appreciative will be your husband because he's appreciated your patience okay and he might be the one who shows kindness in this stage to say listen maybe move on in your life and marry somebody else mm-hmm marriage is not annulled at this moment right unless he blatantly hid his impotency from you for example it doesn't look like the doesn't look like there's no that there's a sexual issue but maybe pregnancy and you know there are people who took 12 years to get pregnant yeah some 15 years so it's not something that automatically becomes divorce in terms of artificial insemination by donor is not allowed in Islam okay artificial insemination by the husband the sperm of the husband is allowed in Islam only the husband not artificial not not from this donor and the husband if he is going to provide sperm cannot masturbate themselves to provide the sperm they would have had to have been pleasured by their partner of course for the sperm to be provided for that right okay they're starting to come in there quite fast I was living under domestic violence by my husband for a year and since and then moved to my parents house since then I have been asking for divorce from the known sheikhs and scholars but none has helped me it's been seven months that we've been separated what should I do in this situation now I find as well I've actually had that response relayed to me by a number of people that some alims see it alims shake alims I just not helping out as much yes I've heard this as well I also saw how your earpiece just fell off but I'll go past that but I've heard that as well and I've seen that you know it can be difficult as well let's let's not make it sound like it's always easy for a Molana to sort out a divorce you know many case more lines can't win no if they give an opinion that one side's right the others hate them for life yeah you give the opinion that that side's right yet these lot hate you for life mm-hmm and you have to see their faces on side of the Jama'a and side of the Jama'a and will add and Shahad and Muharram and Shahad Ramadan and they want you to resolve everything for them what I do believe I personally have an opinion that when I see someone has beaten their wives yeah I'm stray way of the opinion that try and help that lady get her divorce there and then there's no need for talking over this because that person who can beat their wives with the bruising and everything but I also have the opinion that there may be some relationships that come to an end now I know that the Quran says Muadda and Rahmah Muadda reciprocal love Rahmah is the mercy you show when you're getting older right yes I understand that I also understand that some die out there's no conversation right there's no romantic edge anymore you're just there because you don't want the community to say that there's been a break up yeah and labeled now what do you do like it's really difficult and so when you go to a moulin and in some cases the moulin will turn around and say you know but if you break up the kids may be affected and so on some moulin is provide good answers right some might say well seven months I've tried seven months is not crazy at all because that moulin might be saying that listen it's a seven month period and I appreciate what you're going through but it's a major life decision that you're making and some don't realize a grass is green on the other side there are many couples you look at and they look like you know the couples that show their happiness the most in some cases are the most unhappy yeah then I think secondly it's important for us to understand that someone who's divorced and the community's hard for them to get married you know the Prophet peace be upon his family the divorcee and the widow were two areas where Arabia found it difficult to forgive the divorcee and found it difficult to forgive the widow widows done nothing wrong divorcee they always imagine that you know you don't want to marry divorcee for example and so what you have is that the Prophet peace be upon his family married a divorcee and he married a widow our community is if you're labeled as a divorcee is a problem especially for the ladies the sisters in our community therefore some moulin is may not straight away say to you that yes because they also know that the decision is a big one it's a huge decision okay some cases the kids are looking at you and even look at the moulin and say don't make it easy in some cases so there's a number of factors involved right okay fine we've only got a few minutes left say it now so I'm going to cram in yeah a couple of questions the last question via whatsapp is if you divorce your spouse more than three times can you remarry the same one person now divorce the spouse three times if you can maybe just I will elaborate on the divorce divorce divorce and three separate divorces in our next yes I think that's why the difference in the differences in the school in Islam sure and the pronunciation of divorce many people ask me the pronunciation of divorce Arabic only or can it be in a different language as well okay okay what if I turn around to my wife say one go some schools in Islam say it's divorce what does the Shiite school next week show we're going to be looking at you've reached the stage of divorce legally what takes place at this stage right okay I think this is gonna be one last question so now so we've got another question if a wife is not being maintained and her husband doesn't have sexual intercourse with her either from a fake or theological point of view what is the stance on this compared to that Christianity if there is one Christianity divorce wise you'll have can she can she ask for the divorce can she and what this again comes back if financially he's not maintaining right it's late in about it okay not someone who's going through a bad time economically financially no he's late now why should I maintain you got your parents right and there's no relations between them there should be a relation you know there should be relations between them and should never be a period longer than four months where you two are not in a relation with each other if you look at some traditions yes if that person there's no relations between his wife in that way or he's not maintaining and he admits this the marriage is done if he admits this okay okay so what we will do the Maulana the Hakim Shara would speak to him he's admitted to him they've then undertake for the divorce proceedings okay very quickly very quickly we'll try and continue this last point inshallah next week but there's a clear verse in with respect to arbitration the Holy Quran talks about in Surah Nisa verse 35 and I'll just very quickly read the translation and if you fear a breach between the two then appoint a judge from his people and a judge from her people if they both desire agreement Allah will affect harmony between them surely Allah is knowing aware so my question or point is this that we'll hopefully inshallah continue this episode and this point actually into the next one but is it is this arbitration right at the end very quickly is it when it's there's a clear necessity yeah so you don't you don't necessarily want to in some cases yeah move from argument to divorce right I think the why is of the community I've intentionally quoted that just to make sure that people know that you know you don't just take drastic action correct yeah the why is of the community should get together right the why is of the family should speak with the why is of the other family okay sit sit down begin to retrace their roots begin to retrace their relationship and say where are we heading now yes why has it reached this stage yes and remember one thing when you come to an arbitration don't come in an angry mood right imam Ali of the father of alaihi salam says Amir says wonderfully don't make decisions when you don't make promises when you are happy okay and don't make decisions when you are angry right and the problem is in many of these divorce arbitration cases before we've even got to the Moulana's and everyone you got two arbiters we're already going into this discussion a very bad mood yeah if you make a decision when you're angry my father does not he says do not do that and so I think what's needed psychologically go into that stifar ghusl wudu okay dua Quran then enter it clear ha ya Allah whatever gets me closer to you let it happen okay go in there and try your hearts I'm not saying this for all cases because we mentioned there are some crazy cases but then there are some cases where there's been a little there's been a little problem there's a bring the arbitration go in there with respect go in there with a lot even if you to decide to end it but maintain amicably maintain that respect so that the religion is represented in the best of ways and you represent yourself in the best of ways likewise sometimes that person who has been bought as an arbiter always try and make sure that that person is somebody who's known for their calmness and patience mm-hmm and for having a lot of experience with these issues that may not necessarily be the moulin of your community no no and maybe somebody who's been a chairman and a president of your community somebody who's done a lot of counseling you know those people tend to give good advice yes advice from the teachings of the ahl al-bayt al-amsana but you said wonderfully the Quran said get arbiters before you make any of these decisions say all of you listen to their advice reflect on your behavior maybe you look in the mirror and you realize that when you point three fingers at anyone there's always one pointing back at you yeah okay thank you viewers we've run out of time from dr. said Amar nakashwani and myself Muhammad Ali so I only come inshallah we'll see you again next week but we'll continue the topic of Islamic Divorce and we'll propel this forward into the further steps that the dr. said now Amar was speaking about please also call in and also to do generously donate if you can on imam was saying TV mama saying TV does need your funds the call the number to call actually is 0203 51501 double nine and also what's at 4407 939917163 once again from both of us salamu alaykum


So, I am Professor Ankur Kulkarni from Systems and Control Engineering at IIT Bombay, when I will be teaching this course, so in the IIT Bombay code is SC607, it is called optimization. In PTEL it will be called optimization from fundamentals. So optimization as a topic is mainly about choosing the best alternative out of a given set of alternatives, that is basically that is the purpose of optimization. And this is a quantitative subject, so when we have to quantitatively specify what the alternatives are, we have to quantitatively specify what it means for an alternative to be better than another alternative. So, that means we have we quantify the value or the cost or the benefit of a particular alternative. We also quantify what it means for an alternative to be an alternative, so why is it an alternative. Now, all this is very easy if you could simply list down all the alternatives and run through them and select them. So that unfortunately is not the case with most problems. Usually the number of alternatives itself is very large, how changing going from one alternative to the other, how that changes your benefit from it is also is usually complicated and unclear. As a result then one has to you need a formal approach to all of this. So that is why this is a subject in its own right. So the main elements of any optimization problem are as follows. So first is as I said we want to quantify what is the best alternative, so this quantification of alternatives is done through a function, through a real valued function. So we and by convention what we want to do is get the least value of this function by convention, this is just a convention, let us call this function f, okay. Now at least value over what set of alternatives, so the set of alternatives is called feasible region. So for example, for example your set of alternatives let us call this set S, this could be a subset of the vector space Rn, your function f could be just a function that maps Rn to R and what you are looking for is the least value of it. That means you are looking for an alternative x star what we want is an x star that belongs to S, f of x star is less than equal to f of x for all x and x, this is what we want. Now this is the ultimate goal, if you can get an x star sometimes we do not really want an x star, we just we only care about f of x star without actually explicitly saying what the x star is. So both of the x star is referred to as the optimal solution and f of x star refers to as the optimal value. Now the English meaning of the word optimal is somehow unfortunately different from both minimum and maximum, the English meaning somehow optimal can not something in between minimum and maximum, but that is not the sense in which we want to use it here. By optimal it means it solves the optimization problem, the goal of the optimization problem is to find the least value of it. Now why did we restrict to least value that is by convention, we will see later that it does not matter if it is a standard way of posing a particular problem, you can talk of maximum value also that is equivalent. Now I was saying that if you could list out all the alternatives then the problem is very easy, but usually the number of alternatives itself is huge and sometimes in many interesting cases it is actually infinite. So let us consider for example I want to find the shortest path from IIT Bombay to IIT Delhi, shortest path in some according to some measured in some way, suppose this may be measured by distance or measured by travel time whatever in measured in some units, shortest path from IIT Bombay to IIT Delhi starting from the gate of IIT Bombay to the gate of IIT Delhi. So now how many paths are there, I can so for this I will need to specify what is the environment, what is a path, I will have to give you the entire map, what sort of routes form a path, put together all of that you will realize that the number of paths is huge because pretty much at every juncture you can fork this way or that way and still somehow end up reaching IIT Delhi. So the number of alternatives is immense as you can see, but if you just do this in Google Maps right now, open up your app and do it in Google Maps you will find that in a matter of few seconds you will get a route. So it is certainly doing something more intelligent than cataloging all, searching through all the alternatives, it is probably searching through some but certainly not through all because the number of alternatives is immense right. So it is certainly doing something intelligent there, it is probably once it realizes that this alternative is bad it is also realizing that some other alternatives are bad and therefore eliminating all of them etc, etc. There is something, some intelligence is built into all of this and all of that is part of optimization. Let us consider another problem, today is the first day of registration so the problem of assigning classrooms to courses okay, hundreds of courses IIT Bombay offers hundreds of courses per semester, we have hundreds of classrooms there are about 10 to 15 different maybe 15 maybe 20 slots I do not know different slots that the courses can get offered in. Now you want to come up with a matching, you want to match courses to classrooms and slots okay, but then there are also other constraints like for example classrooms should respect the capacity, the registration okay, if you have 100 students registered you cannot see them in a classroom of size 50 whose capacity is 50, so you need a classroom of suitable size for suitable courses, some courses may require say for example lab courses can be done only in laboratories, some courses require that students be able to do programming in the class, so they have some additional requirements only certain types of classrooms can be chosen. All of these are additional requirements that may complicate the problem and in addition to all of this instructors have their own preferences, they prefer a certain slot, they prefer a certain room etc, etc. Now this whole classroom assignment problem is would be you can say well the way we can think of it is, we would like to get a classroom assignment and a slot assignment for courses that is as close to the instructor preferences as possible without violating any of these constraints, so you have to but then you see the number of alternatives here, 100 courses, 100 classrooms, the number of combinations you can make out of all and several slots, number of combinations you can make is immense, out of that you have to come up with one kind of combination for at an institute level that will be closest to the stated set of preferences of the faculty. So this is an optimization problem, it comes up in day to day life, we solve it every semester, similarly Indian railways, BST outside on the street, all of them they are also solving such problems in some or the other form during their day to day operation. So as you can see basically optimization is essentially comes up everywhere as you start thinking about it even without knowing at many times you are doing optimization, when you are deciding which way to order from, where to order food from for example you are trying to pick the best offer which app should you use to recharge your mobile bills, you are trying to sort of, you are trying to see where you will get, where you can get the best cashback or whatever, all of this is optimization without knowing.


I think it will be a symbolic impact more than an effective one, because if Ireland was to vote no, the treaty, the fiscal compact, will enter into force, probably. I mean, there's no need for unanimous support from all the EU member states. Only 12 of them have to ratify the fiscal compact, so to have it entering into force. So there's no blockade from the Irish people or citizens. On the other side, the Irish people will choose not to benefit from the permanent stability mechanism. So it will be perceived either as a sign of optimism, meaning a country feeling that it doesn't need any longer any solidarity and support from the EU. It could also be perceived as a risk taken by this country. What is certain is that it would be a negative sign in the second success story, which is being built by this very impressive recovery effort by the Irish people after the economic and financial crisis we've been through.


Okay, so hi. Thank you for coming. My name is Dekaterina Moraru and I'm an interaction designer for Xwiki. I'm going to talk about open source design feedback and it's going to be a panel mostly and these are my colleagues from the open source design community. I wanted to be a very interactive session but because we have only 25 minutes and 25 minutes and topics very very broad I will encourage also the audience to participate. So if you want to participate to the questions that are being asked because I don't know maybe we will not have time to ask everybody you can use the QR codes and the surveys there and we can see also what do you think about the topics. And the first question are who do you represent so that would be an easy question for you like if you are designers or developers or other things and I will also start when you introduce yourself and I will ask the panel members to say their names and the community they're representing. So Bernard. So hello I'm Bernard the guy from just before. I'm part of the open source design community. I'm a user researcher and interaction designer and I'm trying to sort of get more involved in more open source projects. That's me. I'm Jan and you probably already know that I'm from the previous talk that I am at MixCloud and I'm mainly interaction designer and yeah I'm also active in open source design and a few other open source projects. Hi I'm Elio I'm a visual designer. Yeah let's go a bit closer. I'm a visual designer mostly doing stuff for Mozilla and tour project and I'm representing URA where we help many other open source projects with design. Hi everyone my name is Victoria I'm an engineer with interest in usability. I represent first open source design and I try to work on Valentina project. Participate us to the survey. Okay so we have five designers and five developers that's great. This means that it's very equilibrated that's all. So the first questions that I will ask the panel it's what do they think that understanding designer motivations improves the feedback and what I mean by that. The audience we need to discuss and to say what do they think motivates a designer to participate in the open source and some example of options are money, fame or sharing experience or not. And for you guys do you think it's important when you provide design feedback to understand why the designer it's contributing or you want to keep it professional it doesn't matter. So do you think that if you know that a designer wants money in open source you should treat it different or if you know that it's his I don't know doing this pro bono you should maybe be more polite to him or is it changed the approach for communities when. So I think that design contribution and no difference from any other contribution to open source and it's very important to play by the rules of the community. So if you are wanted to be a part of contribute of the open source project you need to explain how you came to this decision and it's a difficult topic usually. So in UX design especially the most important process is explain the journey why you make these decisions and then you have a chance to succeed and make your contribution accepted. I wanted to add something about that as well. So when an open source project is born there isn't probably there is a need for something new and the founders of the project understand the importance very very clearly. So one of the problems which comes up when a designer comes into the game is that the communication of the importance of the mission of the whole thing why the people are doing this is not translated well to the designer. So this is why there might be a lot of technical contributors because they understand the need for the project while designers might lack that understanding. And I think there's a gap between the communication between the technical leads of the project and designers because it's like it's like telling you why I love that particular kind of coffee. It's like no one will understand that unless you explain them because the coffee beans are roasted in that way and because it's fair trade blah blah blah. If you talk in that process like you can you can ah that's why you like that so much. Okay I understand why this is so important to you and if you are doing especially if you are doing this pro bono this is something a designer needs I think. There's something the audience said that designers are motivated to gain experience and to share experience and are not really motivated by money and fame. What do you think about this? Yeah I mean I would agree so I also wanted to say something like touching on what Victoria said I think it's like because design or we shouldn't treat design as art of course because it's quantifiable and it's basically any designer whatever they do like if they do it full time or if they do it pro bono or if they're just a volunteer they're just kind of a voice for for the user basically or for whoever is using it in the end so usability is quantifiable so it doesn't really matter in what capacity you contribute to the project so it's like you're just a channel for better usability for making better design happen so yeah that shouldn't be part of like who you are or why you contribute to the project. Question for audience who is the target in open source project and the options are the owners the designers the users and world and this is an interesting question so the panel should ask how understanding the panel improves the feedback the community gives. One example I could give is that when a committer looks at the design thing he doesn't think about his users he's just providing subjective feedback so who is the target in open source and how is that important and how does that influence. I think the first question who's who's the target the target I mean a target audience of your project of your open source project and how understanding that helps you provide better feedback. I think it's probably the world I mean and the world contains the users and everybody else. What do you think about designers that consider themselves to be experts in a certain domain should the designer be the one that provides the most important feedback. No it should also be the user well it should be the users ultimately and the designer is the voice of the user. The contributors who like code are also possibly the users possibly so you have to take into account everybody's feedback. I mean I just think it's important that it's we don't see like or we don't say the target audience is everyone because then we don't have particular focus right so we have to we have to first focus on like a specific group and then maybe maybe maybe specifically cut that up into into different groups of target audiences so yeah I definitely don't think it's the world because like I don't know not like only half of the world is using the internet or something so for example that right so it's definitely not the world and yeah. I don't know about the 14 said the users. The options are a bit blurry. For example when you say the world you have to say that when you do a design feedback or a proposal you can put it on Twitter for everybody to see it and that could be considered the world. Either you just show them to your community. I'm not sure if it's on on topic that I just wanted to add it's easy to say for whom we build software for users but it's very difficult to follow this and we sometimes assume oh I'm the user I know everything so if you build a project just go out and see people use your product that's the only one way we can learn. So the users whoever you see using your project and then you learn and improve. So very hard to make it very specific because if it's the world you are not surely who you're targeted are they advanced users are their normal users are they from most specific geographic region and this might be or not important when when you propose something. We have is who makes the final decision. And this is one of the important things and this should be clarified from the start. So options for the audience are all designers users in the world so they're the same options from from before. So I have some personal experience with that. I guess I think I mentioned that before. So when someone asked you for for contribution. It's hard to understand who makes a final decision. And doing that in the beginning right in front can avoid a lot of misunderstandings in the in the later because sometimes people want to work in the open doing request an open source design. But they want to have the final decision. So if you're an open source project you are the founder of the project you want to create it. You want to have the process in the open. But you want to have the final decision in the end. So OK I can understand that. But that would be great if you can say that sometimes you want the community to have the decision. So this creates this can avoid quite a lot of conflicts if it's in the brief if because open source design is quite niche yet. It's nice to have a clear communication and. But designers are not committers. So I believe that community have to decide always and community will balance itself and please please give your opinion. So I think it's those who make the software. And those are committers and designers all together and they have they as a community make decisions. We cannot separate it. Thanks. I think like in many cases it will ideally become a discussion between all of these groups. I suppose that like only one of them only one person is responsible would be sort of very classic management. And I hope that in our projects we can have a discussion together and make sense of it together. Not a combination of everybody. Sorry. On the other hand I think that designed by committees some is a way for things to go certainly wrong. So there is I think that there is one reason that you might decide that OK after all the discussion if you haven't reached some kind of consensus. Somebody has to make a final decision hard decision. And in my opinion that should be the designer. And since you said that I would expect if there was a design made there was some research or some testing done with users and I would look for the data. And if there was no data then it's more difficult. But if you've done usability testing with X number of people here's data. There's no data. This is the default would be my. Yeah. I mean it's difficult to make a decision without any like if it's just opinion against opinion or if we treat design as an opinion. So again research basically trumps these these factors like objective factors. I just think it's important not to think of design as an opinion because I mean you you go to school you learn a profession. And that I mean you can't always have statistical data saying it's a good design. It is a profession. And yeah. Anyone else. The next question is how does time influence the feedback process. So something very problematic I've seen is bike shedding like people talking about maybe that color should be a bit more purplish or something. But because I like purple. So that's not the right thing to approach things and bike shedding generally takes a lot of time and this waste of time. As again I said. Oh sorry. Yeah. Hey camera. As again as I said depends really on the who makes takes the decision so takes depends on the question before. So the bigger the community or decision making committee is the longer it takes. So if it's only one decision maker obviously takes much less time but it's less transparent. So it's a compromise always. One thing to know is that in open source design process and feedback can take like couple of months. So even in our community we've seen proposals that they didn't receive for I don't know five months responses and etc. And for designers can be very hard to go back in that mindset and remember what they've been there and create another iteration. So yeah. But oftentimes the time also helps to rethink and like get out of the maybe the thing you were stuck in back then. So you you can get removed from like your baby that you created as a designer and you're so attached to and yeah you get detached a bit and you can think about it more clearly again. So and another thing that is very important when you request design work. It's to also mention how much time that designer has to work or not because for example when requesting things for free. There might not be an urgency and if you want something very fast at least tell that designer that I don't know that OK it's free and it's fine but you need detergent or or not. No. OK. Well you want to say yeah. What would be great sometimes like often people seem to be unsure what they what they need and that's like super well it if you don't know how to approach a design problem. If you're not a designer yourself and in that case I think it would help for example communities like like ours a lot of people would be just frank about it and say I would like to have that improved. But I don't know know why so please first help me to to make a good decision about that. I think that's really important because design isn't just about going away and doing something in a in a in your tower and coming back and saying here it is. It's also talking with the people who have asked you and if they don't know what they need then it's your job to go back to the start and say OK what is it that you're looking for. And let's talk in the simplest of language. And then you get to the point where you've got a better understanding of the design thing that you're trying to do. OK now I understand. And it'll save pain and hurt. Make a summary of the things we discussed and it was if you were to pick one of the factors that is the most important design process which one would be. And the options were knowing who is the decision maker and or knowing what is the motivation for designer or understanding the need knowing the target knowing time constraint or any other thing. And currently for example the most important factor from the audience they consider to be the need so understanding first the need when you do a design. So talking to people. Yeah I mean like of course I agree it's the need but unfortunately some most often the reality is that you actually don't have time to do usability testing especially in open source. So unfortunately it ends up being just a whole bunch of opinions of a whole bunch of people on your issue tracker. So I think that's actually a good point that understanding the need is the most important point and doing usability testing or any kind of testing is a very important thing in design as a whole but especially in open source projects. Yeah it's been mentioned before it's I think it's the most important thing is that design not to treat design as an opinion because like people look at it as a form of art which it isn't. So for example you cannot say I like red so let's make the logo red because you need to understand that red might be aggressive it might in some countries it might have a different meaning. You might want to know that sans serif as font is different than serif font because blah blah blah. So you get to have arguments I think I can understand if you don't have the background to to to get that but comments like I love it or I hate it because man are kind of like unconstructive so I think this kills the process of feedback. Final question and when should the feedback the feedback process stops and the audience has options like after X number of votes or. I forgot. When the committee decides to when the designers decides to after a number of iterations. The designer. So the main questions was do you need to do like exciterations or do you need to wait like seven months or do you need to make the designer happy do you need to make the commuters happy the world or I don't know. I mean if we talk about it on a broader scale I think the feedback process never stops because software is ever changing and so that but that also helps making the individual feedback processes stop because we say OK what's the best for like the next. Half a year or what's the best for right now and then we also have things for for more future iterations so I think yeah at the same time it's it's good to realize yeah this will change in the future maybe anyway and five years ago it looked much different. And yeah but but that also helps for the immediate decision to say this is going to change in the future maybe anyway but we can always so we can always revisit it but for now let's let's decide on something which works for now. So I see that the winner is when owners are happy. Are they ever happy. So I think that it's very important to say kind of know that there should be time for several iteration because the first result would never the best would be never the best one. So when you plan to design something just just accept the idea that it should go through several iteration and even if you're not happy happy with the first one move on and iterate again. So the process never stops because we improve software constantly and it's never gets to the best point because everything is changing software has to change as well. So process never stops. I strongly disagree with this result. I'm sorry and I just want to do a comparison with that like there's a reason there's a CTO there's a reason there's a creative fleet. So imagine like a designer taking on the CTO position. I don't like this line of code like please don't do it like that. I don't like that. So it's that equivalent of the owners not liking or liking the decision. So if you have asked a designer to help you what's the point of asking a designer when you're doing the decision yourself anyway right. You just need a robot to implement the design for something which you have in mind because that's not how design works. So I think like everyone has their own skills and this should be respected of course in a more open and transparent way. So let's yeah that's a nutshell because we're late. So I sorry I completely disagree with this result as well. The software is being developed I presume for users. The designers opinion doesn't really matter if the users are happy with the software and they're using it more and there are more users and everybody is happy. That's a win. That's my opinion. Thank you. Maybe we just didn't have the option when the users. Yeah maybe there's no option. Katharina was being intentionally provocative. Okay. So thank you so much. We also have the please provide feedback for the sessions and thank you so much for participating.


I just said to my friend one day, that's so dead cool, and she was like, wait. It was kind of our way to give a middle finger to the fragrance world as a whole. We wanted to create something that hadn't been done before. I'm Karina Chaz. I am founder and CEO of Dead Cool. I created Dead Cool as my approach to be in the non-toxic beauty space. I wanted to create beautiful wearable scents that are good for you and good for the environment. My family is very into the organic life, and I was born into a family that created beautiful cosmetics. I was always kind of helping them in their lab. The manufacturer and facility was my playground. I guess you could say that I was a tomboy. With that, I was always intrigued with more masculine scents. I became intrigued with the idea of creating a new identity and category for this industry that has really been at a standstill for quite some time. The Dead Cool process really started just with notebooks and doodles. I have little sketches of the barcode and the bottle design and how I kind of wanted to see something come to life. From there, I started making a Vibes page on Instagram. People want to see how things are made. They want to know where their products are coming from. The moment I stepped in front of the camera and used my personal Instagram as a driving force, I saw a huge shift with the exposure and the sales. For me, the success really comes in where people choose to wear scents that I've composed as their daily wear.  It becomes their personal aesthetic. I get a lot of people always asking me, like, how did you start your business? How did you know that this was the right move? And I always say, like, it's really just creating a vision and how do you want to see something and how are you going to make that vision come true? And of course, with everything, there will be some type of rejection. But you just can't let it get you down. Just do what you do best and build everything that you can and they'll come back and it happened. So it's pretty incredible.