AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Wednesday questioned the uniformity of the Uniform Civil Code Bill tabled in the Uttarakhand Assembly, claiming the Bill doesn’t apply to the majority community of the state. He further said that the Bill is nothing but a Hindu code applicable to all.
“The Uttarakhand UCC Bill is nothing but a Hindu Code applicable for all. Firstly, Hindu undivided family has not been touched. Why? If you want a uniform law for succession and inheritance, why are Hindus kept out of it? Can a law be uniform if it doesn’t apply to the majority of your state?” he wrote on X.
His reaction came a day after Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami tabled the proposed Uniform Civil Code Bill in the state legislative Assembly.
The Bill pronounces polygamy, ‘halala’ and unregistered live-in relations as illegal and punishable acts.
The Uniform Civil Code, 2024 reads, “A bill to govern and regulate the laws relating to marriage and divorce, succession, live-in relations and the matters related thereto.”
The Bill categorically states that a marriage may be solemnized between a man and a woman only if “neither party has a spouse living at the time of the marriage”.
With regard to halala, it says, “The right to remarry under sub-section (1) includes the right to remarry the divorced spouse without any condition, such as marrying a third person before such.” Nikah halala is a practice in Islam in which a woman, after being divorced by triple talaq, marries another man, consummates the marriage, and gets divorced again in order to be able to remarry her former husband.
The Uniform Civil Code (UCC) Bill also advocates for making live-in relations legal and punishable on violation of norms. It says submitting statements by partners to a live-in relation under the given format will be mandatory once the bill is enacted.