Vol. 14, Part II · pages 496–500

1276 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Dr. C. D. Pande: Let not morality be governed by law ? If you have any illusion that you can govern people’s morality by law, you are mistaken. Shri Lakshmanan (Tranvancore-Cochin): He is not addressing the Chair. He is addressing individual Members as ‘you’. Dr. C. D. Pande : I am sorry. It is a manner of address to say ‘you’. ‘You’ does not mean an individual Member. It means the Legislators here. Mr. Deputy Speaker: No interruptions please. Dr. C. D. Pande: I do not mind the interruptions, because the case that I am putting before you is sustained by the will of the people outside. I know the people. I know their difficulties. I know the prevalence of the customs. The difficulties that will be created will be enormous. You have not got the machinery to deal with the cases. The cases may be in far off places where there will be no Government machinery. People manage their affairs in an automatic manner. There is an automatic adjustment in social affairs. That automatic adjustment of the society will be disturbed. You wish to take upon yourself a responsibility for which you are not prepared. Moreover it is uncalled for. There is no justification for it. No case has been made out for the abrogation of customary law. A case has been made out for making divorce easier, not for restricting the scope of divorce. Why do you want to enact legislation which is not in consonance with the likings of the people and which goes against the very spirit of this Code ? This Code seeks to confer divorce and you want to restrict divorce. If this contention has any validity, then I submit the Law Minister will consider the matter carefully and sympathetically. *Shri Oraon : ( English translation of the Hindi speech ) Sir, I had not to speak much about this Hindu Code Bill; but we are now confronted with a situation which compels me to speak something. I mean to say that Scheduled Tribes and Abroiginals are neither Hindu nor Muslim nor Christian. They are without any religion. First they were not included in this Bill nor did they want themselves to be dragged into it. But now I find that we too are being dragged into this Bill. I want to say that the divorces which take place amidst our Community, perhaps do not take place in any part of the world. We know that not less than 80 or 85 per cent divorces take place before *P.D., Vol. XV, Part II, 22nd September 1951, pp. 3112-13.

1277 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL any child is born as a result of the marriage. If some action is to be taken there or a divorce is to take place, we shall be handicapped in getting the case recorded with a Panch. It is said that the case will have to be recorded in our own Panchayats. The Mukhia of that place will go to the court and apply. If either of the two—man or woman, who come for divorce do not agree to his decision, the case will proceed further and move to the court. We know how many divorces take place. Not even in 18 months will the cases registered in only twelve months be decided. Dragging us into the Hindu Code Bill, therefore, is not only injustice but our virtual death. I would request the learned doctor, therefore, to exclude us from it. Next, whatever we see in the Hindu Code Bill, is both good and bad. May be, people living in the cities may not know this, but we are villagers and come across people of all types. All of them are against it. In this state of affairs we see that on the part of the members of the Parliament, the representatives of people as they are, this will not be a right course of action nor will it be right on the part of the Government to pass this Bill. It is, therefore, I must say that this Bill should not be passed unless new elections are held. *Shri Jangde : ( English translation of the Hindi speech ). Sir, I have been listening to the speeches of the Hon. Members for the last four or five days. From their speeches it appears to me that clauses are not being considered, but that general discussion has started. I wish to recount the objections raised by the hon. Members against this Marriage and Divorce Bill and I consider it my duty to reply to them. Just now Shri C. D. Pande said that a loose custom of marriage and divorce prevalent amog 90 per cent of the people should be left intact. He also asked why should the Dwij communities, among which this divorce custom does not obtain, be compelled to adopt it. Pandit M. B. Bhargava: He did not say this. Shri Syamnandan Sahaya : This was not said. Why are you unjust to him? Shri Jangde : He said that this matrimonial code, which is going to be passed, would greatly lengthen the procedure of marriage etc. and would create many difficulties for the village people. *P.D., Vol. XV, Part II, 22nd September 1951, pp. 3117-20.

1278 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Babu Ramnarayan Singh: He came only to give a sermon to us. He did not speak on any clause in particular. Babu Ramnarayan Singh: You deserve it. Shri Jangde: I have been doing work of social reform among these 90 per cent of the people and I know them thoroughly. I know their marriage and divorce customs very well. The people who are speaking on their behalf do not know them. They speak only to place obstructions in the progress of this Bill. It has been said that easy divorce is a very good thing. I want to tell you sir, that the custom of divorce among the Shudras has become so old and useless that it is being highly misused. Today the honour of our mothers and sisters is at stake on account of this. They are sold in Calcutta and Bombay and they embrace other faiths. Today among the Shudras a woman does not enjoy even as much respect as a cow does. A cow is sold only once, but women are sold many times. The custom now prevailing among them has become the custom of the high-handed and is no longer the custom of the poor. You say that if this custom is abolished, people will have to incur much expenditure in the Law Court, but I cannot help praising the wisdom of Dr. Ambedkar who has suggested the remedy that the decisions of the Panch of the caste shall not be binding until the sanction of the Government is obtained. Today what we do is to marry, perform the custom of Saptapadi, and to sell her (the wife) after two or three days. People become ready to sell and divorce her. In this case, what is the meaning of sacramental marriage and Saptapadi ? The old customs have become rotten. You want to maintain them. You want to keep them in the name of Hindu religion. But I want to tell you that 90 per cent, people of Hindu society are becoming opposed to them. Women are not shown any respect. They are labouring under difficulties. You say that we regard them as Devis and Saubhagya Lakshmi, but this is all wrongly put by you. Just now some hon. Members said that they did not want divorce for the Dwijas and why should they be compelled to adopt it. This is the opinion of many of the hon. Members. You want to place the lion and the cow in the same category. Should the hunter and his prey be placed together ? Do you want to unite the East and the West ? They can never meet. On the one hand you say that there should be no divorce among the Dwijas, on the other, you say that loose divorce should be maintained among the Shudras. This anomoly is

1279 DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL leading to a fall in our moral and human standards. The Hindu Code has been drafted to reomve this extreme kind of discrimination and to bring the Dwijas and Shudras from Cape Comorin right upto Kashmir together. You want to spread the awakening among the Hindus. I say that the Hindu Code Bill would be a great help in this direction. You do not want to show the same sense of moral values which has been shown by Dr. Ambedkar in drafting this Bill. In this connection I wish to say that if there can be any means of bringing the Dwijas and the Shudras together, it can only be the Hindu Code Bill. You say that it should be applied only to those who want it, and those who do not want it should not be compelled to adopt it and none should be forced to adopt monogamy and divorce. In my opinion propaganda has been done in the wrong manner is this connection. Government have no money and they do not want to do propaganda in this respect. Not the supporters, but the opponents of the Hindu Code are doing forceful propaganda. Once I heard that Karpatriji said in a speech that it could even make marriage between father and daughter possible. Similarly other false propaganda is being done. It is said that it would lead to marriages between brothers and sisters and the Hindu religion is going to pieces. I say that the diseases which have crept into Hindu religion are being sought to be removed by treatment. This is the aim of the Hindu Code. Such a propaganda is being done in this connection. You say that you do not want divorce, but on the other hand, you want that it should be introduced for us. Among the Dwijas a married woman who becomes a widow, cannot be re-married in any case but men can marry a hundred times if they like. This is no justice. Just as Rama married once ……… Mr. Deputy Speaker: You leave Rama aside. Shri Bhatt: He should be allowed. Shri Jangde : I was speaking of the evil custom prevailing among the Shudras. We want to change it. Every person can marry five or six women. In no home are women married according to Saptapadi are found. They go away with the high-handed persons. By changing their women repeatedly they incur much expenditure. More than half of their property is spent in marrying these women. Is it justice that a woman married to a man should go to another ? This Bill in which you see the end of the Hindu religion has been introduced to remove these evils. Therefore, without taking more time I would like to submit that if you want to see the renaissance of the Hindu religion, if you

1280 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES want to maintain it and bring the Dwijas and the Shudras together, the amendment in respect of Marriage and Divorce clauses of the Hindu Code Bill should be accepted. *Shri T. N. Singh : ( English translation of the Hindi speech ). Sir, I am delibratley speaking in Hindi, because some of the hon. Members and particularly shri Oraon, by speaking on the Hindu Code Bill in Hindi, have in a way asked us to do the same. We have one thing specially in mind while discussing this particular clause 4. Dr. Ambedkar has certainly tried to take a place in the galaxy of Manu. Parasher and Yajnavalkya by following in their footsteps, but I believe that it is an unjustified effort on his part because our traditions have gradually evolved according to the dictates of time and circumstances. They are formed on the basis of collective wisdom and experience. Therefore, the wisdom of any particular individual cannot affect them. What I mean to say is that we cannot violate our traditions so simply and so easily. We perhaps do not even know all of these traditions. I would challenge Dr. Ambedkar, our Minister of Law, to state how many traditions of ours, which he wants to destroy completely through this Hindu Code, are there in this vast country of ours, in the Bharatvarsh. How far is it proper for him to say that these traditions which he perhaps does not know of should be completely destroyed ? Therefore, you can make efforts to follow Parashar or Yajnavalkya or any other lawgiver ( Smritikar ) but, for god’s sake, do not make this wanton assault on these traditions. Sir, I would like to tell you that a good many traditions are being followed by innumerable people in every corner of our country. They are perhaps being followed on a higher level of morality that what was obtained by Manu, Parashar or any other Smritikar. Can anybody today say that in that section of our country to which our Shri Theble Oraon has the Honour of belonging, many things, many traditions, many laws are not such as are highly superior to our laws ? In my view this divorce (perhaps there is no one word of it in Hindi). ( An hon. Member: Vivah-Vichheda. ) You may say Vivah vichheda, but it is not one word anyway, the rules in force there in this regard are far superior to the rules in our Code or rules found anywhere, in England, in America or elsewhere. In our opinion it is not proper to curtail them or to boast that this Code or this measure is better and should replace them. Therefore I would appeal to our Government, *P.D., Vol. XV, Part II, 22nd September 1951, pp. 3126-28.