Vol. 14, Part II · pages 226–230

1006 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES not much of a uniformity. Many commentators advocated seven and five prohibitions : others have advocated five and three prohibitions. They thought it was not necessary to go beyond five and three prohibitions. In the Yajur Veda the restriction is three and two and in certain Vedic texts it does not go beyond two. In this Bill it is my contention that we are only reverting to the old order, the Hindu law as it was in the beginning before it became contaminated with contact with others. (Shri himatSingka in the Chair) As regards the principle of monogamy, under the Hindu law as practised today the Hindu woman shall have only one spouse. Shri Kamath : One living spouse. Shri B. K. P. Sniha : Living, or dead also. Shri Kamath : One can have one dead and one living. Shri B. K. P. Sinha : In certain cases one only, living or dead. So far as males are concerned, there is a misconception that the Hindu law allows polygamy. But I find that there are certain texts of Yajnavalkya, Manu and Apasthambha which ordain and lay down that a Hindu can have a second wife only in certain well-defined circumstances. When the relevant clauses come up before the House I will quote the shlokas and the texts. Pandit Malaviya : Do you suggest that ? Shri B. K. P. Sinha : I do not. Now Bombay and Madras have passed legislation laying down that there shall be monogamy. This principle of monogamy has been recognised for Hindus in the Special Marriages Act and in the Civil Marriages Act. I find that this principle, that it is salutary to strick to one spouse has been recognised indirectly by the Married Women’s (Separate Residence and Maintenance) Act which recognises that a married woman can get separate residence and maintenance if the husband goes in for another wife or a concubine. It has been recognised that oneness of a spouse is slautary. Any deviation from it is bad and in that case the woman is allowed the right of separate residence and maintenance. Shri Kamath : What about polyandry ? Shri. B. K. P. Sinha : Then I come to the other principle, divorce. Dr. Mookerjee was furious; he said that Hindu marriage was sacramental, indissoluble, immutable. There is no escape for a man who once commits a mistake in marrying a certain woman ! But I find from some of the old texts that Hindu marriage was not as immutable, as

1007 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL indissoluble as Dr. Mookerjee would claim. I would read out a text which tells us that even the woman has a right to go in for another husband. This is the text of Narada and Parashar: u"Vs e`rs izozftrs Dyhcs p ifrrs iR;kS A i×pLokiRl` ukjhxka ifrjU;ks fo/h;rs A “Another husband is ordained for women in five calamities, namely, if the husband be unheard of or be dead, or adopt a religious order, or be impotent or become outcaste.” Pandit Malaviya : Will you kindly read also the commentary on that? Shri B. K. P. Sinha: I will leave it for you. So it was not as indissoluble as Dr. Mookerjee would like us to believe. There were provisions for dissolution of Hindu marriages in certain exceptional circumstances. Thereby, the principle of contract was recognised indirectly. Moreover, the Civil Marriage Act also recognises the principle of divorce and these authorities apart, in the modern age, in the present conditions of India, If we do not have a law of divorce for the Hindu society we must be prepared for the disintegration and the ultimate dissolution of the Hindu society. In this connection I am reminded of two or three cases which created such a furore in Bengal, the home province of Dr. Mookerjee. Hindu law as practised there does not leave any scope for divorce. I know at least of two cases in which the parties belonged to the Brahman caste. They were married. They led a happy life for some time. Thereafter, their life was unhappy. There was no escape for them. In both the cases, the wives went to a famous mosque at Calcutta and were converted to Islam and thereby they got the marriages dissolved. Society in India has reached such a stage that if you do not have a law of divorce you must be prepared for such incidents, I do not know whether Dr. Mookerjee by standing against this provision is doing any good to the cause of Hindus or like all fanatical champions he is doing positive harm to Hindu religion and Hindu society. Shri Chattopadhyay (West Bengal): Did they not later on become Hindus ? Shri B. K. P. Sinha : At any rate, it is clear that if you want divorce you have to be converted to some other religion. I urge that only. There are many such cases where parties have adopted some other religion just for obtaining divorce. We must take note of advance and

1008 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES progress. We must see the stage that society has reached. We are not living in an age when India had no contact with the outer world. We are living in an age when ideas have a knack of crossing the borders of countries. We are living in an age when certain theories of liberty and certain theories of freedom have crept into the minds of men and women, especially young men and women and, if we do not allow scope for the working of those ideas it is my fear that Hindus society as we know it today shall not long be able to maintain its existence. Then some of my friends urged that the provincial laws were there and why we should not leave the matter to the provincial governments. That is exactly the reason why I urge that we should have a Central law. Marriage, divorce, adoption, succession and inheritance form part of item 5 of the Concurrent List. It is open to any State Legislature to Legislate on any of these matters and some States have legislated. Supposing we do not legislate, what would be the consequence ? The consequence would be that custom, for which Dr. Mookerjee shed so many tears, would be abrogated in all the different provinces by the provincial legislations and then you would have statutory laws differing from each other in all the provinces. If custom is the only vehicle of progress and development, that vehicle will be destroyed and there would be rigid compartmentalised law-26 or 30 laws, in fact as many laws as there are provinces or States in India. I shudder to think what will be the effect of that on Hindu society and ultimately on the strength of the nation, for a stable and uniform society is an essential ingredient of a strong and stable nation. Then there is the question of inter-marriage. In previous times, people of one territory were born in their territories ; they grew up in their territories ; and they died in their territories. They were governed by the customs and usage of that territory. What do we find today ? In this Parliament, in the galleries of this Parliament, there are Members from all parts of the country. Shri Kamath : On a point of order—can the galleries be referred to? Shri B. K. P. Sinha : I am not addressing the galleries. If I can talk of the country, I can as well talk of the galleries. Residents of various parts of the country are assembled here. Not only in this City, but in every important city of this country you find persons from different provinces—in Calcutta you find people from Travancore ; in Travancore you find people from Bihar and Calcutta.

1009 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL Very often, the residents of the different provinces, in spite of the restrictions imposed by customs and usage and sentiments of the orthodox, find ways of coming together, in nuptial contract. What shall be the effect on them and their progeny if we allow these various provincial laws to operate. Suppose a man from Bombay marries a girl from Bihar and in Bihar he marries another woman. In Bombay monogamy is the law. What will happen to his marriage in Bihar. While his children by that Bihar wife will be legitimate in Bihar, when they go to Bombay they shall be considered illegitimate and shall have no civil rights. What will happen to the hundreds of couples coming from different castes and different provinces ? What will be the rights of those children ? If you allow individuals to opt, many anomalies are likely to arise. A man may opt for the new Code ; his father may be governed by old Hindu law ; and the optee’s son may not opt for the new Code. What laws would govern such a family ? If, therefore, the suggestion of my hon. Friends were to be adopted, there will be such confusion, that the confusion in the tower of Babel as compared to this was nothing. It will take the Judges centuries to clear the confusion. Therefore, I feel that we have reached a stage when in the interests of Hindu society we cannot but have such a law. Previously in the provinces there was certain rigidity—people living in a certain province had one social tradition. People of the same caste had almost the same intellectual development, the same cultural code, etc. In those circumstances, when one married out of his caste one went to a different world altogether. But today these cultural, economic and intellectual disparities are disappearing. Society in India is becoming one. While previously there was some justification for marriage within one’s caste or inside the province, there is no such justification today. because the cultural level, the intellectual level and the economic level of the various communities are coming on a par with each other. According to eugenic principles marriage outside one’s caste under the previous state of affairs would have been bad. Today the laws of eugenics point in a different direction altogether. They point to a direction in which the hon. Mover of this bill is attempting to lead us. Dr. Mookerjee talked about the intensity and the depth and breadth of feeling in the country against this Code. I am a villager. I do not come from one of those advanced cities where the most modern theories are the order of the day. I know the minds of the villagers on this matter. I know that there is a lot of misapprehension in their minds about this

1010 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Bill. That is because the opponents of this code have for the last five years or so been carrying on a tearing and raging propaganda against it while the supporters of the bill have been keeping mum and slient. In my area also people were by and large, opposed to the provisions of this Bill. But when I explained to them the provisions of this Bill in detail I can tell you that at least 70 per cent, of them became converts and they realized that nothing short of this was needed for the society. When Dr. Mookerjee says that there is intensity of feeling I concede that. But when he talks of the depth and breadth of that feeling I disagree. There is no depth in it because that feeling is based on ignorance. There is no breadth in it because the people, by and large, are not against this Code. It is only a handful of moneyed people who care more for their property, for their land, for their shares who are putting up such a row against this measure. I have had intimate talks with some of these orthodox people. They do not care a grain, an iota for the Hindu Law or the Hindu principles, or the rishis or the smritis. What rouses them into opposition is the property clause. Shri R. K. Chaudhuri : That has been dropped now. Dr. Deshmukh (Madhya Pradesh): But wife also is property. Shri B. K. P. Sinha : These are the three lines of my argument. There is nothing revolutionary in this. All that we are going to have is already there on the statute books. Secondly, this Bill does not go against the fundamental principles of Hindu religion. Rather, it tries to bring the circle full. The wheel has gone a full circle and Hindu law is being restored to its pristine purity. Thirdly, this law is essential for the existence of Hindu society in the circumstances of today. Since one of my friends from Bihar, Mr. Syamnandan Sahaya, when he spoke last referred to Dr. Jayakar, I would like to quote a very small paragraph. While writing his foreword to Hindu Law in Bharat published in 1951—and the foreword was written in 1951—what has Dr. Jayakar to say about this aspect—not about Hindu Law in general but about the aspect to which I referred ? He says : “The author has not omitted to note some of the prominent deficiencies which exist in present-day provisions of the Hindu Law, requiring early redress.” An Hon. Member : Who is the author ? Shri B. K. P. Sinha : The author is another person, but the foreward is written by Dr. M. R. Jayakar—a scholar of Hindu Law, not the politician. Shri Syamnandan Sahaya : Also a politician.