Despite the Opposition and some pro-government voices too, questioning the merit of raising the marriage age for girls from 18 to 21, political analysts see a deeper motif. This will be just another brick towards achieving the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) wall.
India, being a heterogenous society with various faiths and traditions, enacting a blanket rule will only be possible after certain milestones are covered. The contentious Prohibition of Child Marriage (Amendment) Bill, 2021, aims to silently equate the Indian populace in matters of law applicability in issues pertaining to marriage, divorce, custody and inheritance.
The arguments for the proposed law range from being beneficial to women’s health and career to their right to choose in a mature way. However, the Opposition points out that rural socio-economic conditions are often are the crux of early marriage. For fear of either rape or losing out on a better match with advancing age, most of the rural folk marry off their daughters young.
The BJP’s sankalp patra (manifesto) in 2019 came with certain promises. Among the prominent ones are: abrogation of Article 370 granting special status to Jammu & Kashmir, construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, the prohibition of triple talaq — and the introduction of a UCC in place of a variety of personal laws that govern matters within different religious communities.
Before the next general elections in 2024, the BJP has only the UCC left to accomplish. The saffron quest for a uniform civil code has been on since 1998 when the party’s manifesto raked the subject to ensure “progressive practices” for women across religions. The slogan for “gender justice” carried forward to the party’s 2004 vision document, and also the manifestos for 2009, 2014, and 2019.
However, the Opposition and Muslim leaders, in particular, point out the lack of consensus-building before tabling the bill. Some state the the move is merely to score points ahead of the UP elections. Senior Advocate and Congress Rajya Sabha MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi listed out the inherent flaws in the proposed law. “Firstly, to believe that merely passing laws amounts to substantive and lasting social change, is to live in a fool’s paradise. Secondly, these reform measures must be debated. And last but not the least, a lot of work must go into reforming mindsets. Fourthly, the bill must be accompanied by supportive nutritional, dietary, educational, and employment reforms for women between 18 and 21 years.”
According to E.T. Mohammed Basheer, an MP who belongs to the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), the new bill reflected a trend towards encroaching on religious personal laws. “The Modi government has already tweaked the divorce law of Muslims and now it is targeting marriage,” he said, adding that inheritance and adoption may be next on the agenda. “This is surely a step-by-step way forward to the uniform civil code,” he said.
According to Asaduddin Owaisi, Hyderabad MP and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief: “To bring UCC into force, the government will have to amend all personal laws including the ones of tribal people.” Former Union minister and senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid also pointed out that the lack of consensus-building was problematic and there needed to be “more debate and deliberation”.
