Uniform Civil Code:Should India be uniform in everything? Or can it?

What does constitution say? 

Now in India, as all you know, criminal laws are common for everyone living here. But personal laws are followed variously for various religions except the major one. All the policies currently India has in its constitution are inaccurate and misleading or more clearly, confusing. The argument is that uniformity is a part of the constitution which may be cited with article 39 and also article 44 which reads "the state shall endeavour to secure for the citizens a uniform civil code". At the same time, articles 25, 26 guarantee one's fundamental rights which assure the grant to practice one's own religious customs and traditions freely, under limitations of being subject to morality and public order. Naturally the question of "which" is "what" arises as to imply which practices are moral and which are not, which will not disturb public order and which will not. Despite these, the Indian society clings onto its values and runs consistently, though not very smoothly. 

What does the situation call for? 

 The thing is that some personal laws are considered to be anti-women in nature or to say, irrelevant and obstructive to the modern world. Sure, any religious custom must have been originated for a reasonable cause but evolution of that system into different forms is inevitable and out of any control of any single authority that the current form of it may seem wrong to a common man's mind. Circumstances decide everything. So what a reasonable approach would be is to check for such tradition's relevancy to the current life-stream but not completely. Because UCC cannot be a complete solution for all problems either and also it is not the only implication of the term 'uniformity' in the fundamental law, for India being a pluralist democracy. Australia can be considered as a fore-runner on this issue where the implementation of UCC has been readily accepted by the Muslims and other minorities.

 What were the previous efforts? 

 In the book "Six thousand days:Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister" by Amiya Rao, it is quoted as Jawaharlal Nehru saying that UCC is intended for "freeing our people, especially women from the outworn customs and shackles which have bound them." Jawaharlal Nehru and B. R.Ambedhkar both as modernists wished to reform archaic personal laws and bring them in line with progressive notions of gender justice. However when they started, they faced bitter opposition from minorities against the implementation of uniform personal laws. Nothing can be fully satisfying unless the change starts from the community itself. UCC interfers with religious rights, yes, but there have to be a compromise to ensure complete uniformity and to avoid human rights crisis. The same modernists who wanted to 'reform' archaic personal laws and to bring inline with progression didn't want to apply that to other communities as, especially Nehru did "not wish to create the impression that we are forcing any particular thing in regard to minorities' personal laws." 

There are some instances we should consider for to get the real meaning of uniformity and fundamental rights.

The first case: 

The petition filed by Indian Young Lawyers Association and five women lawyers seeking a direction to allow the entry of women into the Sabarimala Ayyappa temple without age restriction can be clearly cited as an example of the misunderstanding or misusing the term 'gender justice'. The verdict is yet to come but it has raised an important argument as "whether tradition overrides the constitutional provisions" or "the constitution interfers with the religion." My opinion would be that not both of these are valid arguements for this context coz this is something we shouldn't see in a human rights perspective. Justice Mishra had stated in favour of the petitioners by posing the question "if a woman finds her faith in a temple idol, how can tradition stand in the way of her right to worship?" Really, this is not a question of human rights deprival and gender partiality as this is not the only such place and there are many temples I could cite in which only women are allowed in a particular festival day and such. Should men's right activists(!) file a suit in courts against this? Justice Mishra had also observed in favour of temple authorities on the case, "if the lord is not pleased to see you worship, then why do you want to compel him to be pleased?" Similarly when the court ruled that dress code should be followed inside Tanjore Brihadeeswarar temple, many commented about the violation of individual freedom to dress freely. I don't doubt their intent but these are such futile and unmeaningful commentaries. Does anyone comment about the dress code imposed inside a school campus wrong?

The second case:

This is the most well-known instance in which the issue of protection of women's rights as part of broader fundamental rights came into conflict with the religious rights. In 1985,65 year old Shao Bano filed a case seeking alimony from her husband. For this,  court came into action and granted her her right. This created widespread agitations condemning the interference of law into religious customs. No one can have a say in this situation unless one 'is' in the situation. Maybe during the important period of a religion's growth, people wouldn't think of giving rights (or they might not have thought about it as a right) to the other gender. But this is the similarity among almost all religions in the world and so we can't entirely reason everything with circumstances. There can be sole reason alone for some customs. For example,in hinduism, daughters don't get share on property inheritance. For me its not completely rights deprival on gender partiality, because daughters are sent with gold to husband's house to handle financial crisis after getting married which is a share of her father's property in form of gold. Moreover the daughter is considered to have fully become part of her husband's home. But, like I have said already, the transformation of it into various forms is inevitable amd uncontrollable.

What is then a solution can be? 

There cannot be any single solution to this issue, I think. Setting rules from human rights point of view and being completely anti-traditional would mean repealing all the current civil laws and making the very foundation of the "secular" Indian foundation meaningless. So, for me, a fully uniform civil code doesn't stand as a solution at all. Rather laws can be watered down to be followed only under certain extraordinary circumstances and courts be given a framework alone to handle situations as it comes. Or if not, here,  I have my say: Allows the majority to follow their own personal laws too. India is secular,  right? So everyone have their own secular claims.

(Disclaimer:From these points it shall not be taken that I am being anti-minority. It would be foolish to speak nuetral even in issues just for the sake of minority involvement where there is clearly justice belonging to one side)