The Congress on Friday attacked the BJP on the Uniform Civil Code issue, alleging that it seeks to divide people and spread hatred, days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a strong pitch for bringing the common code.
On Tuesday, Modi in Bhopal had made a strong pitch for UCC and said Muslims are being instigated over the sensitive issue. UCC relates to a common law pertaining to marriage, divorce, inheritance, maintenance and succession of property for all citizens.
This is not a UCC, but a "DCC - Dividing Civil Code" that seeks to divide the country's politics, Congress spokesperson Meem Afzal said and added that the "UCC is not the agenda, rather the agenda is to divide the people of the country".
"The issue is to divide politics and people and spread hatred among them. Even the prime minister is naming a particular section of people, whereas this issue is not of one section. This is an issue of every section, every religion and every language. If you are doing some work, it should be acceptable to all," he said.
Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari also said according to his understanding of the law, "review of personal laws means review of existing personal laws" and "the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) is not law as yet".
"To put UCC under the same rubric of existing laws may be or is a bit of a stretch," he said.
Opposition parties have termed the move as one aimed at polarising society ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Kerala Chief Minister and senior CPI-M leader Pinarayi Vijayan alleged that the BJP's "electoral agenda" is behind raking up the issue of UCC and urged the central government to withdraw from implementing the code.
In a statement, he said the Centre's move can only be seen as a plan to implement the "majority communal agenda of 'one nation, one culture' by wiping out the cultural diversity of the country".
"The Central Government and the Law Commission should withdraw from the move to impose the Uniform Civil Code," Vijayan said.
BJP's ally in Maharashtra, the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, said it supported Balasaheb Thackeray's vision of "one nation, one law" and appealed to the Centre to hold a discussion on UCC in Parliament's Monsoon Session.
During a press conference on the first anniversary of the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government in Maharashtra, Shiv Sena leader and Lok Sabha MP, Rahul Shewale, declared his party's complete support to a UCC. He was accompanied by MPs Hemant Patil and Krupal Tumane.
He urged Chief Minister Shinde to get a resolution passed in support of UCC in the upcoming monsoon session of the state legislature and send it to the Centre to let it know Maharashtra's stand on the issue.
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said UCC will soon be implemented in his state. He tweeted this after a committee of experts set up by the state government announced a draft is ready.
He said that "as per the promise made to the people of the state, today on June 30, the committee formed to prepare the draft of the Uniform Civil Code has completed its work".
"Soon Uniform Civil Code will be implemented in Devbhoomi Uttarakhand," Dhami said in the tweet in Hindi.
Earlier in the day, Supreme Court Justice (retd) Ranjana Prakash Desai, who heads the panel, told a press conference in Delhi that the draft of the proposed UCC for Uttarakhand is ready and would soon be submitted to the state government.
