Beyond The Veil Of Personal Law: The Uniform Civil Code As An Instrument Of Gender Justice In India
- IJLLR Journal
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
Tanu Kumari, KES Shri Jayantilal H Patel Law College
Keshav Dadhich, KES Shri Jayantilal H Patel Law College
Ankit Yadav, KES Shri Jayantilal H Patel Law College
ABSTRACT
The debate on Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in Article 44 of the Indian Constitution has always been politically sensitive due to its relation to religious identity politics and minority rights issues. Regrettably, the political nature of the discussion has steered attention away from the very objective of adopting UCC – achievement of gender justice and obliteration of patriarchalism in family laws. This paper considers the rationale for introducing UCC through the prism of feminist jurisprudence. The main thesis in this paper is that uncoded religious laws with their archaic male interpretations influence negatively the civil rights of women regarding marriage, divorce, inheritance, and maintenance. This research paper presents detailed analysis of legislative codification of Hindu personal laws since the controversial Hindu Code Bills in 1950s up to the momentous amendments to Hindu Succession Act in 2005. Such analysis will illustrate the effectiveness of legislative codification in protection of women's rights.
In this research paper, there will be a critical consideration of the problems associated with Muslim women's personal law – the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act, 1937. The focus will be placed on shortcomings of judicial codification in solving problems like permission to have several wives and the right for unilateral divorce. Most importantly, in this paper, it is aimed to challenge the traditional objection to introduction of the UCC saying that Indian society is still immature enough to implement such law. The socio-legal concept of cultural lag will be introduced in the discussion. By means of two historical examples – abolition of sati practice in 1829 in contrast with 1987 tragedy of Roop Kanwar case and opposition to the Special Marriage Act – this paper claims that legislation should precede social development. In other words, the law must play proactive role rather than follow the trend. Thus, in this paper it is proved beyond doubt that introduction of gender-just UCC becomes absolutely necessary for providing women's fundamental rights in India.
