Fact Check: Did Sania Mirza Divorce Shoaib Malik Unilaterally?

Hyderabad: Speculation about Sania Mirza and Shoaib Malik’s marriage running into rough weather had been doing the rounds since the end of 2022.

Sania’s recent Instagram post, part of which said ‘Marriage is hard.. Divorce is hard.. Choose your hard,” fuelled fresh speculation.

But it was only after Shoaib posted pictures of his wedding with Pakistani actress Sana Javed earlier on Saturday that Shoaib and Sania’s separation finally became official.

Though there has been no official word from the Mirzas yet, PTI quoted a family source as saying that the divorce was a ‘khula’, which refers to the right of a Muslim woman to unilaterally divorce her husband.

This is former Pakistan cricket captain Shoaib’s third marriage. He first tied the knot with Ayesha Siddiqui in 2002, that marriage lasting eight years. Shoaib then got hitched to India’s leading female tennis player in 2010, the couple being blessed with a son in 2018.

Pakistan TV star Sana, on the other hand, divorced popular singer Umair Jaswal in 2023 after three years of marriage.

Rumours of Shoaib dating Sana first made news in February last year when the cricketer wished the actress on her birthday, sharing a photo of them together.