By S. N. M. Abdi
After Assam, West Bengal – the politically, electorally and demographically dominant state in the east of the country – is now all set to roll out the Uniform Civil Code in the wake of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s victory evicting the Trinamool Congress from power. Suvendu Adhikari, the new Chief Minister happily sitting in the fallen Mamata Banerjee’s chair, has categorically said that the UCC will be in place by August. Adhikari is merely taking a leaf out other BJP-ruled states’; Assam’s, Uttarakhand’s and Rajasthan’s; book. And like Adhikari, the BJP CMs of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh too are bent upon tightening the UCC clamp on their respective states without losing any time.
But the state-by-state implementation of the UCC raises an obvious fundamental question in many minds. As the UCC is one of the three top goals embedded in the BJP’s ideology, along with the construction of the Ram temple and abolition of Article 370, why doesn’t the all-powerful BJP enact a central legislation for nationwide implementation of the UCC, instead of various BJP-ruled states implementing it separately? Why not a countrywide federal law rather than state after state enacting their own versions of the UCC.
Separate, state wise UCCs are bound to create severe problems in the days to come. For example, as marriage and divorce are covered by UCC, what will happen in the case of a marriage solemnised in West Bengal, and the husband-wife migrating for better prospects to Gujarat where they decide to go their separate ways? Will they file for divorce under West Bengal’s or Gujarat’s UCC? This is just one example of the complexity stemming from state wise UCCs. There will be myriad problems crying out loud for solutions, creating frustration and dissatisfaction among ordinary people and eroding their faith in the administration of justice by those in power. And this is hardly in the BJP’s interests.
I think that the three wise men — Prime Minister Narendra Modi, his alter ego Home Minister Amit Shah and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh head Mohan Bhagwat – have been forced to adopt the piecemeal approach to the UCC because of the compulsions of coalition governance and the necessity of pandering to allies’ egos.
Living up to the Jana Sangh’s agenda, the BJP has been holding aloft the UCC flag since the 1980s. In the run-up to the 1996 Lok Sabha elections, the UCC figured prominently in the BJP’s manifesto. But the party dropped it like a hot potato from its manifesto in 1998 and 1999. As many National Democratic Alliance constituents were not in favour of the UCC which they saw as the pro-Hindu BJP’s stick to beat religious minorities like Muslims and Christians with, Atal Behari Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani strategically put the UCC in cold storage.
It’s not surprising at all that after getting a parliamentary majority in 2014 under Modi’s leadership, the BJP lost no time in stirring the forsaken UCC pot. But in 2018, the 21st Law Commission poured buckets of cold water on the simmering pot, calling the UCC neither necessary nor desirable. However, six months before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the 22nd Law Commission suddenly issued a notification inviting citizens to submit their views on the contentious UCC. The term of the 22nd commission, which accorded the UCC a modicum of legitimacy, however ended before it could submit a report on the feedback it received.
The results of the last general elections too didn’t augur well for the BJP’s pet project. Short of numbers, the BJP had to fall back on two political parties to notch up parliamentary majority to retain power. Its newfound allies, the Telegu Desam and the Janata Dal (United), have all along been wary of the UCC. They consistently advocated a policy of arriving at a consensus after a thorough discussion before implementing the UCC. Hence, they were dead against imposing the UCC unilaterally on the nation.
Because of their opposition, the BJP failed to enact a central law for the nationwide implementation of the UCC, and had to resort to ushering in the UCC state by state. But this approach has its obvious pitfalls.
As in other BJP-ruled states, Adivasis or Scheduled Tribes, are being kept out of the UCC’s purview in West Bengal too. They account for nearly six percent of the population and therefore matter electorally. Hence, STs have got a waiver! Needless to say, Muslims and Christians will be at the receiving end of the whole exercise. To maximise the BJP’s political gain, Modi and Shah have already framed the UCC’s implementation in newly-won West Bengal as a measure to stop infiltrators from acquiring four wives!
In the present polarised climate in West Bengal, the opposition Congress Party, Communist Party of India (Marxist) or the Trinamool Congress have an extremely tough task on their hands. If they criticise the anti-minorities UCC, the BJP will promptly charge them with Muslim appeasement, which will draw even more Hindus to the BJP’s fold swelling the saffron vote bank. Only the coming months will unveil the opposition’s strategy in today’s trying circumstances.
(S. N. M. Abdi is a distinguished journalist who writes on domestic politics and foreign policy.)
