Since the time the Constitution of India was drafted, the idea of a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) has been discussed in legislative and political settings. The Supreme Court has likewise consistently emphasized the necessity of a UCC.
Uniform Civil Code: About and Purpose
- One nation, one rule is echoed by the Uniform Civil Code, which should be implemented for every denomination group. Part 4 of Article 44 of the Constitution of India specifically mentions the term “Uniform Civil Code.” Article 44 states that the State is going to attempt to ensure that all Indian citizens have access to a uniform civil code.
- In addition to promoting legal parity between communities, the uniform civil code also aims to maintain equality between the rights of men and women within those communities.
- The purpose of a uniform civil code is to provide one law that applies to all religious organizations worldwide for their private affairs, including marriage, divorce, inheritance, adoption, and other challenges.
Uniform Civil Code: Constituent Assembly Debates
- The UCC’s incorporation according to the expert teachers in RJS Coaching sparked a lot of discussion during the Constituent Assembly’s debates.
- The subcommittee on fundamental rights, headed by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, opted to exclude the UCC from the list of essential rights after a vote that generated a 5:4 majority.
- During the drafting of the Constitution, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar stated that while a UCC was important, it should wait to be implemented until the nation in question was socially prepared to adopt it.
- Therefore, Article 44 was placed in DPSP.
Uniform Civil Code: Significant Needs
- Establishment of a substitute legal system based on tens of thousands of years-old principles by permitting personal laws. An all-encompassing civic code would alter that.
- It is evident that caste and religious politics are no longer prevalent in the country. The UCC will promote social progress and assist India in achieving its objective of being a fully developed country.
- Every Indian should be subject to the same laws on land, marriage, inheritance, and families, among other things. The only means by which to guarantee equitable treatment for all Indians is through UCC.
- Personal laws are intrinsically misogynistic, and by permitting antiquated religious precepts to continue regulating family life, we are sentencing all Indian women to oppression and cruelty. The uniform civil code will also benefit women’s status in India.
- It should not be possible for a minority group of people to determine which laws are enforced. These personal laws shouldn’t be ignored in a different time and place because they were developed in a particular spatiotemporal environment.
Uniform Civil Code: Significant Challenges
- India’s strength is the diversity of its society, which has led to the development of personal laws that take these differences into account. Therefore, imposing a uniform code could violate minority communities’ autonomy over their cultures and religions, making them feel excluded and alienated.
- It would take a great deal of time and effort to implement the comprehensive legislative changes required to unify personal laws under a single code. As such, the appearance of new litigation contesting the UCC’s legitimacy may result in an additional load for the judicial system during this transitional period.
Uniform Civil Code: Landmark Judgments
There are various landmark judgments concerning UCC that are discussed in every RJS Coaching institute. Some of them are:
- In the case of Shah Bano Begum, under Section 125 of the Indian Criminal Code’s “maintenance of wives, children, and parents”, which applies to all citizens regardless of religion, the Supreme Court made a decision in her favour and also suggested that a unified civil code be established.
- In the case of Sarla Mudgal, according to the Supreme Court, a Hindu spouse who wants to convert to Islam cannot marry a different woman without divorcing his previous wife and claimed that bigamous marriages and other fraudulent conversions would be avoided by a UCC.
Uniform Civil Code: Recent News
According to the experts in RJS Coaching, Goa, which was freed from Portuguese control in 1961, kept its common family law, recognized as the Goa Civil Code, and is the only state in the nation with a Uniform Civil Code.
According to the Goa Civil Code:
- Even a Muslim man who gets married and is officially registered in the state is not permitted to engage in polygamy
- A married couple equally divides their property,
- Pre-nuptial agreements are prevalent and in the case of a divorce, the man and the woman split their assets evenly.
Way Forward
All Indians do not live under a single statute book that has all of the family-related laws that are acceptable to the several coexisting religious communities in India. However, most of them think that UCC is unquestionably desirable and would significantly contribute to the fortification and consolidation of Indian nationalism. There are disagreements over when and how it should be accomplished.
It is the responsibility of political and intellectual figures to work toward an agreement rather than utilizing it as a wedge issue to further their own political ends. The issue is simply one of treating every human being with respect, something that personal laws have so far been unable to do.
