A prominent Muslim cleric in Bareilly has declared the marriage of Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and senior journalist Nidhi Razdan invalid under Islamic law, dragging the couple’s private life into a fresh and very public row.

Maulana Shahabuddin Razvi, national president of the All India Muslim Jamaat, made the claim in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh. He said the nikah between the two could not take place under Sharia. The couple has not commented.

The cleric’s core argument

Razvi built his case on a single rule. In his words, Islam sets specific guidelines for marriage, and both the man and the woman must be Muslim. If either one is not, the marriage cannot happen.

’Islam has set some rules and guidelines for marriage. Both the man and the woman must be Muslim. If one of them is non-Muslim, then marriage cannot take place.’

He applied that rule directly to the couple. According to Razvi, Omar Abdullah is a Muslim, while Nidhi Razdan is a non-Muslim. On that basis, he argued, a Muslim cannot marry a non-Muslim through nikah under Islamic principles.

The cleric did not stop at the general rule. He also explained the one route he believes could have made the union valid. If the non-Muslim partner accepts Islam before the nikah and adopts the faith, he said, the marriage could then be considered valid. That did not happen here, and that is why, in his view, the marriage is not lawful by Islamic standards.

Conversion before nikah, and why it matters in the argument

The religious question at the center of this dispute is conversion. Razvi was clear that conversion alone after the fact would not repair the situation. The timing, in his account, is what decides everything. A conversion that comes before the nikah can legitimise the marriage. A marriage without it, he said, is not valid under Islamic rules.

That detail is what makes the statement so combustible. It moves the discussion from personal choice to a verdict on religious validity, and it does so about two people who are public figures in very different fields. Abdullah leads a government in a region that has long been at the centre of national debate. Razdan is a working journalist who has covered politics and public affairs for years. Bringing a religious ruling into their household is exactly the kind of move that guarantees a wide reaction.

A marriage announced only days ago

The timeline is short and fast. The couple married on October 30, 2026. A day later, on October 31, they shared photographs from the wedding on social media and officially confirmed their relationship. The cleric’s remarks came after that public confirmation, which is why the reaction has spread so quickly.

Both marriages are second marriages for each of them. Omar Abdullah was previously married to Payal Nath. Nidhi Razdan was earlier married to journalist Nilesh Mishra. Those earlier marriages are not part of Razvi’s argument, but they add to the public attention around the couple’s personal history.

Silence from both sides

So far, neither Chief Minister Omar Abdullah nor Nidhi Razdan has responded to the cleric’s claims. There is no statement from either of them on the controversy in the material available to us. That silence leaves the religious claim standing on its own, at least for now, in the public conversation.

It also means the debate is being shaped largely by the cleric’s words and the reaction they provoke. Religious leaders frequently weigh in on inter-faith relationships, and their rulings can carry weight with their own communities even when they have no legal effect. Razvi’s statement fits that pattern, presenting a religious position as a settled answer about whether the marriage is valid.

What we know, and what we don’t

The facts here are clear. A cleric in Bareilly, speaking as head of the All India Muslim Jamaat, has declared the marriage invalid under Sharia. He based that on the religious status of the two partners and on the absence of a conversion before the nikah. The couple married on October 30 and went public on October 31. Neither has responded.

What remains open is how the couple, or others in public life, will respond. The statement has put a sharp religious question into a personal milestone, and that combination is what has made it a national talking point. Anyone following the story will be watching for the first response from the couple, and for whether the debate moves beyond the cleric’s own words.

For now, a single religious leader has delivered a blunt verdict, and the most famous couple in this particular story has not said a word in reply.