New Delhi: The BJP has drawn up an outreach plan to get Muslims on board with the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), a concept that has been vociferously opposed by the community.
The party is looking to hold consultations with Muslim intellectuals and opinion-makers, where it plans to highlight three ways it believes the UCC will empower women — in matters of adoption, inheritance and larger gender equality.
While Muslim organisations like the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) describe the UCC as an assault on freedom of religion, the BJP denies it.
“This is a misconception created by vested interests in the Muslim community, that the UCC will hurt religious freedom,” said BJP Minority Morcha chief Jamal Siddiqui.
“There can’t be any change in customary law as practised by various communities and religions. The Muslims will practise their customs as earlier,” he added, noting that a UCC will standardise adoption law.
Rights of property will ease the life of Muslim women, as happened with the “end of the triple talaq practice”, Siddiqui said, emphasising the need to sensitise the “community about the merits of UCC”.
The UCC is the last major unfinished agenda of the BJP — promised to voters for decades — after the construction of the Ram Temple and the scrapping of Article 370, which gave a special status to Jammu & Kashmir. The BJP’s UCC outreach comes as the party has begun to test the waters on its potential implementation, with Uttarakhand forming a panel under retired Supreme Court Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai to form a draft UCC, and the Law Commission last week issuing a public notice to solicit views and opinions on a potential code.
Based on this, and the consultations with different communities, the Modi government will decide whether to pursue the initiative ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, or put it aside for now.
“We are holding consultations with other community institutions and leaders… As Article 370 was abrogated without much opposition, UCC too will be implemented,” Siddiqui said.
Also Read: Law Commission issues notice seeking views of public, religious bodies on Uniform Civil Code
The opposition
The Muslim community has largely been opposed to the UCC. Earlier this week, prominent Muslim organisation Jamiat Ulama Hind said the UCC was “against the religious freedom guaranteed under the Constitution”, adding that it will hit the streets if it is implemented. The statement came after the Law Commission initiated its consultation process. UCC, the Jamiat Ulama Hind said, is mentioned as a directive principle of the Constitution, which makes it legally unenforceable, while freedom of religion is a fundamental right.
The AIMPLB has also criticised the government for initiating the process for bringing a UCC, with board chairman saying that the body will give inputs to the Law Commission after meeting other Muslim and minority organisations.
“The UCC is unacceptable and it is against the Sharia. The move of the Uttarakhand and Gujarat governments (the state BJP government had announced before the 2022 elections that it would set up a panel to study the implementation of UCC) is unacceptable not just to Muslims but all minorities, besides millions of Scheduled Tribes,” AIMPLB chairman Khalid Saifullah Rahmani said this week.
However, speaking to ThePrint, several members of the BJP minority morcha said that opposition to the UCC is limited to Ashraf Muslims, who form the community’s elite.
The Pasmanda Muslims, who account for 90 percent of the Muslim population, already form the lowest stratum, they say, adding that they are not economically empowered to practise polygamy and are always at a disadvantage in property rights and other Sharia laws.
The BJP is aiming to woo this section of the community to widen its electoral lead in 2024.
Testing waters
UCC finds a mention in the Constitution. Article 44 of the Indian Constitution says, “The state shall endeavor to secure a Uniform Civil Code for the citizens throughout the territory of India.”
However, it is a directive principle of state policy, which means that it is not enforceable. For example, Article 47 directs the state to prohibit the consumption of intoxicating drinks. Alcohol, however, is sold for consumption in most states of the country.
In 2018, the Law Commission had said a UCC “is neither necessary nor desirable at this stage”, suggesting that discriminatory practices, prejudices, and stereotypes within a particular religion and its personal laws be studied and amended.
Goa is currently the only state with a uniform civil code, which is derived from the Portuguese civil code of 1867. Among other things, the law provides for compulsory registration of marriage before a civil authority, and says that wives have a right to 50 percent of common assets — including those inherited by husbands — in the event of a divorce.
The Modi government is testing the waters before it makes a move on the UCC — first, through the Ranjana Desai Committee report and later through the Law Commission report.
This, it hopes, will help it decide whether to bring in the UCC ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, or hold off until a larger consensus is attained.
“We intend to inform the Muslim community about the three benefits of UCC — it will make adoption easier for childless couples, inheritance law will be implemented for women, and women will be treated equally with men,” BJP minority morcha spokesperson Yaseer Jilani told the print
Intezar Hussain, the Uttarakhand BJP minority morcha chief, said they were “holding consultations and sensitising the Muslim community about the benefit of UCC”.
“We have organised three meetings and asked our district units to send their suggestions about the code,” he added. “Most people want codified rule for property rights, marriage, divorce, adoption.” Hussain said “everyone knows that the government can’t change the way Muslims practise their religion”. “But once the code is implemented, the lives of Muslim women will drastically change. It’s in the interest of Muslims — only Muslim leaders don’t want such reform.”
When the Modi government banned triple talaq, “similar opposition started”, Hussain said. “But now drastic change has happened,” he added.
However, a BJP Minority Morcha functionary said “knowing the opposition from Muslim organisations, we will have to carefully build consensus before bringing any code”.
“We have seen the opposition from the Muslim community at Shaheen Bagh on the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA),” the functionary said. “The government had to backtrack from framing rules. Such a situation can damage the BJP’s electoral prospects before the Lok Sabha polls.”
(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)
Also Read: Opposition is wrong in resisting UCC. It’s poor politics, runs against Constitution spirit