The custom was, on the face of it, indefensible. Before today, a Muslim man in India could divorce his wife simply by saying “divorce” three times, and there was nothing his wife could do about it. For her to get a divorce, she needed her husband’s consent.

On Tuesday, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the practice, called “triple talaq,” is unconstitutional and un-Islamic. Islamic scholars agree that the custom has no basis in the Quran. Countries from Pakistan to Egypt have already banned it.

Wisely, India has long tread carefully around religious freedoms, and the board that governs Muslim policy in the country asked for the court not to intervene. The practice is wrong, but let us find our own solution, it said.

Muslim women answered: You’ve had long enough. “It is not a victory that has been achieved after one or two years,” one activist told The Washington Post. “Muslim women have been coming to courts and filing petitions and laying the groundwork for this for years.”

In a turbulent world, their victory of patience and steadfastness is a lesson that echoes far beyond India.