Vol. 14, Part I · pages 446–450

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES428 Babu Ramnarayan Singh : By no means. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : There is not going to be that sweet relationship between brothers and sisters and sisters’ husbands that now exists, because after a girl is married, she will have her husband or her son or somebody else in her father-in-law’s house to control the property of her father’s family and there is bound to be bitterness, bad blood and jealously litigation and all the rest of it. Ultimately the family will break up. Are we going to enact a Code which will facilitate the breaking up of our households ? Will the summum bonum of Social life be reached when every single family is broken up and domestic peace driven away ? It is for you to consider whether this should be done. I feel that these things are bound to happen. Sir, a girl may be educated. But after her marriage when she goes to her father-in-law’s house, she is being guided and dictated in all matters either by her husband or by some relation of his and it will not be in her interest to endow her with a share in her father’s property by legislation here. You will say you will pass another legislation to prevent her from being dictated in respect of the property she has got from her father. If you are going to endlessly legislate in that way, in order that you may have the intellectual satisfaction of having a Hindu Code, I would leave you alone. I therefore, think that this is a revolutionary change and this should not be introduced. This does not mean that I am against making provision for girls. By all means make provision for them. Make any provision for unmarried girls. Make her marriage and her education the first charge on her father’s properly. Make it absolute charge on that property so that on her marriage when she will be absorbed in the family of her husband, she will be divested of her interest in her father’s property. But that is not what you are doing. You talk of equality of sex, justice and fairness but are allowing the girl the right to inherit not only her father’s property equally with the son, but also to share her husband’s property or father-in-law’s properly. This is equality with a vengeance. The girl should not get property from both sides. This will also lead to further fragmentation of property. Shrimati G. Durgabai: The boy will get a share of his mother’s property ? Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : A daughter whether married, unmarried or widowed will get her mother’s property. Let my

DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 429 honourable friend read the Hindu Law. Even as it is under the Hindu Law, all categories of daughters are entitled to Streedhana property. Shrimati G. Durgabai: No, no, no, no. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : I say, yes, yes, yes, yes. Thus the daughter is provided according to the present Hindu Law. I cannot go on correcting the misapprehensions of others. The Hindu law is there. The members of the legal profession know it. I need not labour the point I believe, that there is sure to be more fragmentation. This will inevitabily lead to increased testametary disposition and consequent litigation and ultimate ruination. An Honourable Member: Already there is fragmentation. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : Yes, but two wrongs do not make one right. Because there is fragmentation already, is no argument for making provision for further fragmentation in the shape of more shares to property. Sir, in this field of inheritance, another innovation has been introduced and I think that is the most devastating of all changes. Shri B. Das : That is not the principle of the Bill. You can drop it. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : What is the principle of the Bill ? Shri B. Das ; I am referring to partition and that is not the main principle. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : The system of inheritance is the backbone of the Bill. Under this Bill you are going to scrap the Mitakshara law. Make no mistake about it. The right to property by birth and survivorship, which is the basic foundation of Mitakshara law, is going to be swept away. This Mitakshara system of law has been governing the country for hundreds of years till there was evolved in Bengal the Dayabhaga law founded on the principle of natural justice and affection. Many of my friends who are supporters of the Bill have told me that I should be the last person to oppose it inasmuch as it introduces the principle of inheritance enunciated in the Dayabhaga law of my province. My reply to them was that that was no satisfaction to me. I do not want even if the well-meaning Social Reformers in India wants that that system should be adopted. Even if a superman or dictator comes and tells me: ‘Look here, the law of inheritance in Bengal should be made applicable to all India’, I would be the first man to raise my voice of protest against it. The

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES430 old system has stood the test of time. The change might suit my province, but not all India. I do not want that this Mitakshara law of inheritance should be scrapped in favour of one which is neither the Mitakshara law of inheritance nor the Dayabhaga law. It is a hybrid mixture of both which is conducive to the welfare of none, tending to bring about the disintergation and downfall of Hindu society as it will completely unsettle a well settled order of things. I think I have exhausted the patience of the House and must bring my speech to a close. ( Honourable Members : ‘No, no’) I have dealt with inheritance, I have dealt with marriage. I feel that those two branches of Hindu law which are sought to be drastically amended should get fuller consideration. But it will be a tragedy for India, for the Hindu society, if in the name of reform, you uproot the Hindus from their safe and ancient moorings which have protected them from the stress and storm of centuries. Let me again repeat that our Shastras, besides making elaborate provisions for all matters of social life, left a wide field to wellestablished local customs and usages. They have been very salutary in their effect, as stabilizing forces in society. If we ignore them and make a fetish of codification we will cast Hindu Law into a mould absolutely inflexible, rigid and cast iron; we will be importing into it unncessarily a character which never belong to it. We will be transforming it into something, which will never be able to adjust itself to the needs of times, as it has been in the past. Sir, before I conclude, I will touch on the argument which has been advanced here also, but which has been very lightly brushed aside by those who do not like it. It has been argued—and I believe perfectly rightly—that this Legislature is not competent to deal with it. Shri L. Krishnaswami Bharathi: Legally incompetent ? Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra: Yes. I feel that it is not competent. In any case, if you take shelter behind legal formation, I will tell you, morally you have absolutely no justification for passing this Code. I know this objection was raised not only from people like us, but by people very highly placed in the political life of this country, by people with high political stature ; for instance, by a man of the eminence and standing of the Honourable Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the President of the Indian Constituent Assembly, the sovereign body by which in season and out of season, we are all swearing. I want to know whether or not his views deserve our best consideration. Personally, I have very great respect for him. He is not only the uncrowned

DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 431 monarch of Bihar, but he is one of the undisputed leaders of India. Dr. Rajendra Prasad has given the clearest possible indication. He knows not only the people of Bihar but Bengal as well and also other provinces. He sat up his practice in Calcutta and upto the middle of his life he lived in Calcutta. It is not for nothing that he gave the warning that the Constituent Assembly constituted as it is to-day, ought not to discuss a legislative measure of this nature. I can speak for myself. I cannot speak for others. I honestly feel that I have absolutely no right, legal or moral to be a party to any measure, any legislation, which is not absolutely necessary for the day to day administration. I was returned to the Constituent Assembly with four votes only. I can honestly declare here and now that when I sought all those four votes from the Members of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly, I never promised them that I would give them the right of divorce. Neither did they ask for it. I declare that I never promised them that I was going to scrap up the law of inheritance. I never told them that I was going to the Constituent Assembly to create a fresh Portfolio and a Ministry of Marriage, because I feel that such an institution will be necessary here in the Central Government, if this Bill goes through. Look at the formalities that have been provided here. So, personally speaking, I feel that I have no right to give my assent or dissent to this. I can only tell the House that I am not competent, because I had no specific mandate from my Constituency to do it. When I came in through the General Elections there were clear issues before the Country such as the attainment of the freedom of the country and all the rest of it; and the last time we came here, we were enjoined only to draw the Constitution of India. Therefore, it might gratify our vanity that we as members of the sovereign legislature of the land are competent to enact such a legislation but the claim is shorn of all moral content whatever. Nothing would have been lost if we had deferred the consideration of this Bill to some future dale after the next General Elections. I emphatically maintain, Mr. Chairman, that the time chosen for its passage through this House has been most importune. After the attainment of independence, problems after problems have been confronting the National Government. Have we been able to solve them ? We have not. Are we in the country very popular ? By ‘we’ I mean ‘all’ including that side. No. Frankly, because we raised expectations which we have not been able to fulfil. That may be due to a variety of causes over which we have had no control; that may be due to an interplay of forces, which took us unawares, absolutely unprepared. But throughout the country you find

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES432 simmering discontent. As a matter of fact, I do not feel inclined to disclose my identity as a member of the Legislature, of the Constituent Assembly, when I travel in a railway compartment, because the moment they come to know that, they start vigorously criticising us. Shri B. L. Sondhi (East Punjab: General): Then go by air. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : I have started going by air. Quite true. There also I fare no better. I am not joking. I really feel that the country has become sick of us, disappointed of us because of our failure to do anything real for the common man. Hitherto there had been the Kashmir question. There is the question of commodity prices. Yesterday we had a brilliant performance with the unfortunate—enhancement of post-card rate and the price of cloth. Mr. Chairman : The honourable Member may confine himself to the Bill. Pandit Lakshmi Kanta Maitra : I am only saying that the rise in prices of commodities, labour strikes, the Communist menace, refugee problem etc. have been too much for the government. Is this the time for us to go on with this luxury of Social reform legislation, and a very highly controversial legislation at that ? It is sure to give rise to the bitterest acrimony; and as a matter of fact, it has already brought about a lot of acrimonious controversy. I believe honourable members have been already Hooded with literature ( Interruption ). Of course, from the AntiHindu Committee, and similar societies and associations from Calcutta and elsewhere. I have got protests from the Women’s Association in Poona, I have got protests from Women’s Association in Bengal, the members of which come from the highest aristocracy in the land. I have not known of any Bar Association in Bengal which has not protested against this. I have not known any Bar Associations which have supported this Bill. I have in my possession perhaps the whole literature that has been circulated so far in connection with this Bill. I have classified it and the dead weight of opinion is against it, qualitativley and quantitatively. I again say that the time is not opportune. At a time when, according to our Prime Minister’s appeal we should close our ranks, put our heads together, devote all our time and energy and work in amity and concord so that we may solve the problems of the land, we should not give another cause for disruption, another cause for discord or grouse or discontent in the country. I do feel nothing is to be lost if we shelve this Bill for the time being. If that is not done, then, of course, I promise that I will have to oppose this Bill at every stage. I oppose this Bill, because I feel that it is a wholly unwarranted measure and that there has been