Vol. 14, Part II · pages 151–155

931 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL has brought forward this piece of legislation. It won’t be wrong for me to say that he is still finding it difficult at the age of sixty to know to what faith he has to belong. But he is asking me to decide overnight that I should change. If I may raise my voice-let me not be misunderstood—I am as fit to be in the society as other members can claim to be. I am not ashamed of my religion. I am speaking not only to the men and women in this country but also to the outside world, that we have everything to be proud of the tenets by which we are governed and proud of the law that our ancients gave us. If only the other nations of the world followed our religion and the principles we have adumbrated there, there won’t be these constant wars and all would be peace and peaceful. We are always accustomed to adopt things which are found wanting in the western countries. A motor car which has been discarded in Europe becomes a model of a car here; an institution which has been discarded in the west becomes a model in our country. In 1937 we passed a law in this House that in the case of converts to Islam, their customary law according to Hindu system would prevail in regard to adoption etc. Similarly, in the South the Moplahs of Malabar had adopted certain of the Hindu customs, though they were Muslims. It is not even a question of adoption : they were born with such customs. Therefore, they followed one rule so far as their inheritance and succession was concerned and another rule so far as their faith was concerned. We passed in 1937 what was known as the Shariat Law. This is for all India and all Muslims. Section 3 of the Shariat Act says : (1) any person who satisfies the prescribed authority-(a) that he is a Muslim, (b) that he is competent to contract within the meaning of section 11 of the Indian Contract Act (IX of 1872), (c) that he is a resident of British India—may by declaration in prescribed form and filed before prescribed authority declare that he desires to obtain benefit of this Act and thereafter provisions of section 2 shall apply to the declarant and all his minor children and their descendants as if in addition to matters enumerated therein, adoption, wills and legacies were also specified. Therefore, there is absolutely nothing novel in my hon. friend Shri Jaspat Roy’s amendment. This is a measure which ought to be accepted cautiously. A majority of the community do not want this, and not only do they not want it, but also they are able to take care of themselves. Is this House particularly under the leadership of my hon. friend, entitled

932 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES to tell and advise people outside that what they are following is wrong and that they should change their method ? I am not basing my argument on the ground that this Parliament is not entitled to do that, though my personal view is that this Parliament cannot enact legislation in the way it was doing during the British days. We are now guided by a written Constitution. My own personal impression is that the personal matters of an individual, and the practice by which he is governed so far as his marital relationship is concerned are governed by his fundamental rights and should not be touched by anybody. So long as the practice which I follow and the procedure I adopt in regard to marriage is not opposed to public morality and is not obnoxious, or indecent, it is my own business and nobody has any right to interfere with it. Therefore, we have to go slow in this matter. So far as the progressive elements are concerned, we have made a number of enactments now. The Hindu Widow Remarriage Acts are there. My hon. friend referred to the Child Marriage Restraint Act. True, it has put down child marriages. But it has put down marriages also. Everywhere a new problem has arisen : there are armies of unmarried girls today, there will be no dearth of girls if only you want to enlist them in the army as nurses or doctors. This is a new problem that you have created—have you heard of it before ? Our friends, including Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava, cried hoarse, that by early marriage girls became widows. But is there any guarantee that a man will continue to live, the moment he marries a girl of fifteen. I do not think God in his wisdom has arranged that a man marrying a girl of fifteen will live long, and that a man marrying a girl less than fifteen would die early. Therefore nobody can stand guarantee on this matter. It is a question of balancing the convenience. We have not heard of any marriage except in the human kingdom. Animals don’t marry ; there is no law of divorce among them ; they don’t have family life. It is only with respect to human beings that the institution of marriage is prescribed as one of the purusharthas with a view to avoid inconvenience. As the Maharshi said, of the four purusharthas, the three, that is Moksha, the other word dharma, maintenance of society, and artha, politics or economics, depend upon a happy family life. This is one thing on which all our ancients laid emphasis, whereas in the Western society individualism has been all along in excelsis. Here family is the unit of our society. I do not mean to say that any human institution is so perfect as to obviate

933 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL any inconvenience. So far as our marriage laws are concerned, no woman remains unmarried unless she chooses to remain a sanyasin. A Sanskrit sloka says that no woman is entitled to freedom. But it has been mis-understood. A woman is not born twenty five years old. She is born out of a mother’s womb, has to become an adult, marry and become old also. Both of them, whether a man or a woman, when they are in their teens are minors, have to be under the guiding hand of some other person. So long as the girl remains a minor the father has to maintain her. When she becomes old, is there any better person to look after her than her son ? Therefore at the dawn of life as well as at the close of life both man and woman depend upon the father or the son respectively. The only question is during converture. If God has created both man and woman, either the woman should go and live with the man or the man has to go and live with the woman. In a happy marriage the woman must live with the husband or the man must live with the wife. Is there a middle course ? I ask Dr. Ambedkar ( An hon. Member: they live together). Yes, both of them live together. That is what I am saying. Therefore either the man’s voice dominates in the House, or the woman’s. Let us assume there is a difference. If the man’s voice prevails there is no trouble. Or the man must get himself submerged in which case also there is no trouble. But if there is a difference between the man and the wife as to whom the girl should be given, when is the marriage to be celebrated ? I am only thinking aloud of the inconveniences. It is not as if man produces sons and woman produces daughters. In all seriousness I am addresing this House. What I am submitting to the House is this. Some people have misunderstood, merely because some of our sisters are going about with regard to their share and their sufferings—on account of the experiences that they possibly have had—and the corresponding chillness on the part of our friends here, that it is a woman’s Code. It is something like a husband and wife quarreling “to whom does this child belong ? “It is not either to the one or to the other. Therefore, If this Code emerges, it will belong both to the men and women of this country. Let us therefore look at it dispassionately. We have been brought up for three thousand years in a particular institution. I will presently quote a number of jurists who came from the West and who were attracted by the institutions that prevailed here. Some, of them even become converts and Max Muller created an ashram also. You have their opinions. They have compared their

934 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES own institution with that which was prevailing in this country. They wanted to be converted but for their social habits and customs which weighed strongly with them. As they got enamoured of our institutions we are also now getting enamoured of their ways. Let us examine whether it is useful or not. Let us see what the authors, the Members of the Hindu Law Committee said. Mr. Rau himself said that this is a concurrent subject and as regards such of the chapters the Provinces may be left some voice as to whether this portion should be applied to this community or not. The territory to which it should be applied, whether it should be enacted at the present time or should be postponed all these are matters which any reformer, the sponsor of the Bill including, ought to take into consideration, so that there may be no impression let in the mind of any person that his conscience or religious faith or scruples have been trodden over. We have to gradually take people along. It is not as if we are declaring a war on Hindu religion. It is not an immediate question like deciding whether we should join America or not in declaring China as an aggressor. Here and there an inconvenience might have been felt by some people. I am asking this House, though you, Sir, to see the balance of convenience. It is not as if any human institution is perfect. Without going into details, taking the question of marriage, it is a proved fact that till the Sarda Act came into being, the majority of our women—99 per cent of them—were married. Do you want to say, let women remain unmarried, let men remain unmarried, let there be children who have no parents—like forty thousand war babies to be taken care of by others ? Is it right for you to do so in our country ? You will be creating a new problem. Is it right ? So far either the man had to obey the voice of the woman or the woman had to subordinate her voice. Otherwise where is the house and the household ? That is exactly why the woman is not under the law. The modern woman who is educated in a foreign system, who has lost moorings in her own faith, wants that she should inherit the property of her father and not her husband. She is indifferent. She wants to have the money in her pocket and feel “Why should I be subordinate to a man ?” I know the difficulty in every household but if I am saying these things I am saying so with experience. Girls refuse to marry now because they feel “Why should I subordinate myself to a man ? Give me a portion of the property”. Does my daughter expect me to live perpetually ? It is not money alone that makes for happiness.

935 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL Suppose there is a rich man and his daughter inherits his property. When she is married does it prevent the other man to belabour her and to beat her ? What prevents him from doing that ? Many people speak supporting this Code. I am not referring to Members of Parliament—they know everything. I am only suggesting what many people outside are saying. Today under the Hindu Law the girl is not absolutely taboo. If a man dies leaving no children behind, the widow inherits the entire property. Apart from Deshmukh’s Act, under the ancient Hindu Law she is the heir of all the property of the husband in cases where there are no children. Secondly, if there is a daughter and the mother predeceases the father and there are no other children, she becomes the heir to the entire property. There is absolutely no difficulty. What is sought to be done here is that simultaneouly with the son the girl also must have a share. The responsibility of maintaining the household is that of the boy. We are not rich millionares. The zamindars have also been liquidated. Rajahs have gone. Only the middle class people are there. I am addressing myself only to them. There are the poorest people where both the husband and wife eke out their living by working as coolies. And what happens to the majority of middle class people ? The husband may be working as a clerk getting Rs. 100 or Rs. 200 a month. He educates his boy and expects that when he comes of the age of 21 or 25 he would take charge of the family at a time when he is himself fifty of fifty-five. When he retires there are a number of children to be taken care of. The property that he has accumulated is so small. I know in my part of the country persons who have any holdings over five crores are only ten or five per cent, of the entire persons holding land. Land is the wealth in our country. There may be a few industrialists in Bombay and a few in Ahmedabad. But generally people have neither industry nor land. The only industry for a middle class man is to become a clerk and earn some money, and by the sweat of his labour he earns it. The responsibility of looking after the family is thrown upon that boy. He may get a small land or a thatched house as patrimony. The society expects him to take charge of his younger brothers and sisters and also to maintain the old parents. When the Britishers were ruling us the officials in the Railway Department, station-masters and others, used to get passes sometimes in the year to go round. The pass is for the family. I am sorry to note that the same practice is still continuing as regards the description of the family, namely that the family means himself, his wife and children. What about the old parents ? This may