By Arun Pratap Singh
Dehradun, 22 Sep: As had been indicated by Garhwal Post, CM Pushkar Singh Dhami has finally again extended the term of the Committee of Experts on Uniform Civil Code by four months as had been ‘requested’. The Committee is headed by Justice (Retd) Ranjana Prakash Desai. This is the third time that the government has extended the tenure of the expert committee formed to prepare the draft of the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the state. The tenure of the committee was ending on 27 September, which has now been extended by four months.
Officially, the government claims that a proposal sent by the committee regarding extending the term for 4 months had been received by the government. Special Secretary (Home) Ridhim Aggarwal has confirmed receipt of the proposal. The expert committee has prepared the draft of UCC but ostensibly needs additional time to complete the draft and give a final shape to this. The draft prepared so far is yet to be submitted to the state government.
On the instructions of Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, an expert committee was formed under the chairmanship of retired judge Ranjana Desai on 27 May, 2022. The committee was then asked by the government to prepare a draft and submit its report within six months, but the draft could not be prepared in time and one of the reasons was that the Committee has taken a feedback of a very large number of stakeholders. Sources however also claim that there are political reasons behind the delay and because of these reasons, the government has chosen to delay the implementation. Sources further claim that the implementation of the UCC may be put off till the parliamentary elections which are about 7 months away from now. One of the major political factors is the opposition to the UCC expressed by various tribal communities. As BJP has now a strong support base among the tribals across the country, it may not like to upset the tribals and therefore some fine tuning is required to exclude the tribals from certain provisions of the proposed UCC.