Uttarakhand govt forms 9-member committee for preparing rules for UCC Bill 2024
Uttarakhand govt forms 9-member committee for preparing rules for UCC Bill 2024
M.U.H
11/02/2024165
The Uttarakhand government on Saturday formed a nine-member committee for preparing the draft of rules for the Uttarakhand Uniform Civil Code Bill 2024, which was passed in the assembly on Wednesday.
According to an order issued by the state home department, Governor Lt Gen (Retd) Gurmit Singh has approved the constitution of the nine-member committee for preparing the draft of the rules for the Uniform Civil Code Bill 2024.
The nine members of the committee include Shatrughan Singh, retired Chief Secretary (chairperson), Sudhir Singh, Additional Secretary, Justice department(Member), Additional Secretary, Personnel department (ex-officio member), Additional Secretary, Panchayati Raj, (ex-officio member), Additional Secretary, Urban Development Department, (ex-officio member), Additional Secretary, Finance department (ex-officio member), Barinderjit Singh, Deputy Inspector General of Police, (Training), (Member), Surekha Dangwal, Vice Chancellor, Doon University, (Member) and Manu Gaur, social worker, (Member)
The order stated that the Committee has been formed for the successful implementation of the provisions of the Uniform Civil Code Bill 2024. The Committee has been mandated to prepare a draft of the rules, in which facts related to various procedures, competent level authorities and easy implementation of the provisions of the proposed Act would be included.
UCC Bill 2024 was passed in the state assembly on Wednesday evening after a day-long discussion on the Bill. The Bill has 392 sections divided into four parts and seven chapters.
UCC refers to a common set of laws that will subsume customary laws across faiths and tribes and govern issues such as marriage, divorce, inheritance and maintenance. In the Constitution, it is a part of the non-justiciable directive principles of the State policy.
The Bill has provisions for equal rights for women in inheritance in ancestral properties, equal rights to adopt, divorce, a ban on polygamy, mandatory registration/self-declaration for live-in relationships, mandatory registration of marriages and divorce with common marriageable age 18 for women and 21 for men. The bill has provided an exemption from its ambit to notified Scheduled Tribes. Uttarakhand has a 2.89% Scheduled Tribe population.
After the Bill was passed, CM Dhami in a press briefing had said that now the Bill will be sent to the President of India for approval. “After we get approval from the President, we will start the process for its implementation in the state”, he said. He said in the coming time, if required, the government can also make changes to the Bill.
In the run-up to the assembly elections in 2022, the BJP had promised to bring UCC, in line with its ideological promise that has been a part of its manifesto for a decade. In June last year, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi while speaking to BJP booth workers had made a strong case for UCC. But almost immediately, several tribal communities in both central India and the Northeast started protesting. Uttarakhand’s law is also expected to be the blueprint for other states such as Gujarat and Assam that have promised to implement UCC. Uttarakhand has 13.9 % Muslim population according to 2011 census, mostly in the Terai area.