Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled Uttarakhand on Monday became the first state in independent India to implement the Uniform Civil Code, which promotes equal laws for every citizen across all religions and standardises personal laws on marriage, divorce and property.
With the implementation of the UCC which applies to all people of Uttarakhand except those belonging to the Scheduled Tribe community, the BJP has fulfilled a major commitment made to people of the state ahead of the 2022 assembly polls which saw the party storming to power for a second consecutive term.
Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami announced UCC's implementation at a programme at his official residence in Dehradun, saying with this the constitutional and civil rights of people across all religions have become uniform.
"With the implementation of UCC, the BJP has fulfilled all its major ideological commitments including abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir, illegalisation of triple talaq, the CAA and building of a Ram temple in Ayodhya," the chief minister said.
He unveiled the notification on UCC, released its rules and regulations and launched a portal designed for the mandatory online registration of marriages, divorce and live-in relationships in the presence of his ministerial colleagues and members of the UCC drafting committee.
The chief minister was the first to register his marriage on the UCC portal. State Chief Secretary Radha Raturi handed over the certificate of his marriage registration to him.
Chief Minister Dhami also gave certificates to the first five people who registered on the UCC portal.
"The UCC creating equal laws for every citizen across all religions comes fully into effect at this moment. The credit for it goes entirely to the people of the state," Dhami said at the function.
Dhami said he had gone into the 2022 assembly polls on the promise of a UCC and the people gave the BJP a huge mandate for a second time in a row to form the government and fulfil its promise.
"It is nearly three years since I made that commitment to the people of the state and now the day has finally arrived when we are fulfilling that promise," he said.
Trying to bust the myths surrounding it, Dhami said the UCC is not meant to target any religion or community as often thought.
"It is a constitutional tool to end all legal discriminations in the name of caste, religion or community. It will put an end to all evil social practices like 'Halala' and 'Iddat'," Dhami said.
The UCC does not interfere with the marital rituals of any community, he said, adding that most Islamic countries of the world have implemented such laws.
Explaining why Scheduled Tribes have been kept out of its ambit, he said it has been done so that it does not intrude upon their unique social and marital practices.
Denying allegations that by making the registration of live-in relationships mandatory the UCC usurps the privacy of live-in couples, Dhami said it was meant only to protect the lives of women by keeping a digital record of their relationships so that they are not subjected to violence.
Citing an instance, he said it will help prevent brutal incidents like the one in 2022 in which Shradhha Walkar was allegedly killed by her live-in partner Aftab who kept her body in a fridge after chopping it into pieces.
"I hope the Gangotri of UCC after originating from Uttarakhand will flow to the rest of the country and inspire the whole nation," he said.
Former Chief Secretary Shatrughna Singh, who headed the drafting committee that framed the rules and regulations of the UCC, said special attention was paid during the framing of rules to keep the processes simple, user-friendly and transparent.
It has been ensured that the applications received for registration of marriage, divorce and live-in relationships are disposed in a time-bound manner.
The option of online registration will spare people the trouble of running around government offices to register their marriages, divorce and live-in relationships.
The online registration will also create an authentic, elaborate and almost real-time database of the people of the state, he said.
He praised individuals associated with the UCC drafting committee and those who accompanied him on the panel to frame its rules for their hard work and knowledge they brought to the exercise.
"We are scripting the golden moment in India's constitutional history today by implementing the UCC," he said.
It marks a historic moment as Uttarakhand is the first state in independent India to bring into effect a UCC, modelled basically upon the vision of a single set of laws applying to all citizens, regardless of their religion as enshrined in Article 44 of the Constitution.
It is also the fulfilment of a major pre-poll promise made by Dhami ahead of the state assembly polls in 2022.
On a number of occasions, Dhami has attributed the historic mandate to the party's commitment to the electorate about bringing a UCC in the state.
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