New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Thursday that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) remains steadfast in its commitment to implement a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the country.

Uniform Civil Code has been mentioned in Article 44

Speaking at a session at Agenda AajTak 2023, Amit Shah said, “UCC was the Constituent Assembly’s mandate to the country’s legislature and Parliament.”

The Uniform Civil Code has been mentioned in Article 44, which is part of the Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP). According to this, a uniform civil law should be made for all the citizens of the country. It is of note that the Directive Principles are ideal principles – while governments and citizens can be encouraged to follow them, they are not mandatory.

“In 1944, the Constituent Assembly kept some matters it could not implement in the Directive Principles of State Policy. UCC was one of this. It is a different matter that later the Congress left the matter due to vote bank politics,” Amit Shah said.

“But BJP has held on to this because any secular rule’s biggest indication is that there should be one law for people from all religions…Since 1950, all our election manifestos have mentioned that the BJP will try to bring in UCC,” Shah added.

Talking about different states taking steps to implement UCC, Amit Shah said “Common civil code is a huge social and legal change. We need everybody’s opinion on this. If one state, two states does this, and they form committee and hearings are undertaken…there will be legal scrutiny as well. After that, the mature change will be accepted by the entire nation, I believe.”

“But BJP, under PM Modi’s leadership, remains steadfast in bringing in UCC,” said he.