The Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI) in their say to the Law Commission have said that the enforcement of the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) is not required at this stage. Instead, it strongly recommended that "errors and discrepancies" in the respective personal laws be rectified "without destroying" them.
It further asks the Central Government to take measures to urgently give equal rights to women in Parliament by enacting laws that are pending for years.
Gender Justice and discrimination against women must end
Gender justice and end to discrimination towards women in personal laws has come up and has been touted as one of the prominent reasons for the government to bring up the UCC. The communication to the Law Commission was shared with the media by the Archdiocese of Bombay on Thursday.
The communication goes on to "firmly urge" the Central Government to take the lead in eradicating such discrimination in personal laws and pave the way for others in this regard rather than affecting the sentiments of different communities by annihilating their personal laws. The public notice to enforce UCC, it says, hampers the diversity and unity of Indian citizens. As "proud and fortunate citizens of India", the letter goes on to state that they are treated equally without discrimination or disparity and the constitution helps tackle issues related to properties, marriage, inheritance, divorce, and adoption based on personal laws through courts.
8 points for rejecting the UCC
The letter lists eight points for rejecting the UCC. These pertain to diversity vanquishing in the name of UCC for which India is known world over, whether personal laws will get annihilated totally by overriding them with particular religious practices of any one religion or whether they are kept intact by merely codifying them under the UCC. destruction of special rights and privileges to tribal communities.
Clarity is also sought by questioning on why eradication of discrimination to women cannot be done by tackling laws or brining special laws, why bring when Constituent Assembly debates stated it would not be enforced, urgency of the government to bring it when earlier commission already stated that it is neither desirable nor needed by previous commission, and why not rectify discrepancy or difficulty by enacting a special law or amending existing law (Special Marriage Act) to empower justice delivery system, which is stated as the intended reason behind brining UCC because the courts have found it difficult to decide the cases in the events of couples of different faith married under a law.
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