Postscript

It may be concluded that issues related to codification for Muslim Personal Lawin general and UCC in particular may be revitalized, the movement may be intensi­fied, and eventually implemented in India today in a haste as a political game in pursuit of power.

Notes

1 The total number of listed communities is 6,748, with an estimated population of 1.37 billion in 2019 according to the most recent UN data. Joshi, P.C., ed. Symposium on People of India (New Delhi: Department of Anthropology, University of Delhi, 2015).

2 It is a society having 74 moieties, 172 phratries, 12,893 surnames and 2,492 titles. See, Joshi, op. cit. The plural character of Indian society has been explored by Rasheeduddin Khan (1995). See Khan, Rasheeduddin, Bewildered India: Identity, Pluralism, Discord (New Delhi: Har-Anand Publications, 1995).

3 Joshi, P.C., op. cit.

4 Singh, Kumar S., People of India: Introduction vol. 1 (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002).

5 Qazi used to be the magistrate or judge of a Sharia court, who also exercised extra­judicial functions, such as mediation, guardianship over orphans and auditing public works.

6 Bhattacharya, Subhro and Akshay Shandilya, “Arguing for a Uniform Civil Code in India in the light of Gender Discriminatory Practices under Muslim Personal Law,” Nuals Law Journal 10 (2016): 1—30. http://www.nuals.ac.in/ common/2632016NUALS%20Law%20Journal%202016%20-%20Vol%2010%20 with%20Cover.pdf; Masud, Muhammad K., Peters Rudolph, and David S. Powers, eds. Dispensing Justice in Islam. Qadis and their Judgements (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006), 591 p.; Rahman, Fazlur, History of Religion: Islam. (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966).

7 The list is long; however, the following studies may be referred for this purpose. Bhattacharya, Subhro and Akshay Shandilya, op. cit; Hasan, Zoya, “Triple Talaq Abolition is Only the Start of a Larger Campaign for Gender Justice in India,” The Conversation, September 7, 2017, Accessed 15 May 2020. https://theconversation.com/ triple-talaq-abolition-is-only-the-start-of-a-larger-campaignfor-gender-justice-in- india-83089; Khan, Hasina, “Criminalising Talaq-e-Biddat,” Economic and Political Weekly 52, no. 51 (December 23, 2017): 4-5; Kugle, Scott A., “Framed, Blamed and Renamed: The Recasting of Islamic Jurisprudence in Colonial South Asia,” Modern Asian Studies 35, no. 2 (April 2001): 257-313. DOI: 10.1017/S0026749X01002013; Jyoti, Punwani, “Triple Talaq Judgment and After,” Economic and Political Weekly 53, no. 17 (April 28, 2018): 12-16; Sikand, Yoginder. “Reforming Muslim Personal Law: The Fyzee Formula,” Islam and Muslim Societies: A Social Science Journal l no. 1 (2005): 208-217; Jones, Justin, “Towards a Muslim Family Law Act? Debating Muslim Women s Rights and the Codification of Personal Laws in India, Contemporary South Asia 28, no. 1 (2020): 1—14; Fyzee, Asaf A.A., Outlines of Muhammadan Law, 4th ed. (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1993).

Rehman, op. cit.

Ibid.

The attitude of the ‘Ulama’ towards secular sciences, which seemed to stifle the very spirit of enquiry and with it all growth of positive (scientific) knowledge, needs attention (Rahman, 1966: 5) and a detailed discussion is required.

Rehman, op. cit.

Ibid.

Rehman, op. cit. Muslim Personal Law in India has never been systematically codi­fied. Therefore, it has resulted into the perpetuation of ‘customary practices, diver­gent from the values and principles of the Qur’an.’ In an absence of centralized system of clergy in Islam, BMMA have taken advantage of interpreting religious teachings on their own terms, consulting the Qur’an themselves and refusing to accept the jurisdiction of clerical figures. In this sense, the debate over personal law reform is one manifestation of the wider democratization of knowledge across the Islamic world, as debate on critical issues of Islamic law and conduct is opened up to a mar­ketplace of intellectual, political and professional stakeholders. See, Kramer, Gudrun and Schmidtke, Sabine, eds. Speaking for Islam: Religious Authorities in Muslim Societies (Leiden: Brill, 2018). (LCI) quoted in Jones, op. cit. 2020).

For castes among Muslims see Matin (1996), Falahi (2009). For caste-based discrimi­nation see Anwar, Ali, Masawat Ki Jung: Pasemanzar Bihar Ke Pasmanda Musalman (New Delhi: Vani Prakashan, 2001).

Falahi, Masood Alam, Hindustan Mein Jaat Pat aur Musalman (Mumbai: Ideal Foundation, 2009).

Falahi, Masood Alam, Caste and Caste Based Discriminations Among Indian Muslims, Trans. Sikand, Yoginder (New Delhi: New Age Islam, 2010). For caste as an exclu­sionary process among Muslims, see Matin, Abdul, Farida, Siddiqui, Ziyauddin, K. M., Nageswara Rao, A., Masood Ali Khan, P.H. Mohammad, and Abdul Thaha, S., Muslims of India: Exclusionary Processes and Inclusionary Measures (New Delhi: Manak Publications, 2013); Matin, Abdul, Muslims in India and Abroad: Caste and Ethnicity (New Delhi: APH Publishing Corporation, 1996).

Ali, Athar M., The Apparatus of Empire: Awards of Ranks, Offices and Titles to the Mughal Nobility, 1574—1658 (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1985).

Ali, op. cit., p. xx.

Ibid., p. xvii.

Ibid., pp. xvii—xviii.

Matin, Abdul, “Changing Agrarian Relations in Mithila, North India" (Ph.D. Thesis, University of Toronto, 1990).

BMMA has been criticized for being overly supportive of the government’s bill; the organisation’s demand for the codification of a distinct set of Muslim personal laws is fundamentally different from the BJP’s long-standing political commitment to a UCC for all citizens. In this sense, notwithstanding a momentary convergence of interest between the BMMA and the government on the single question of triple talaq, the BMMA’s call for the codification of a separate code of Muslim family laws ultimately represents a very different vision for how personal laws should be handled.

The organization upholds the existence of distinct bodies of minority personal laws as a constitutional necessity, while simultaneously transforming the contents of these laws themselves. See, Jones, op. cit.

21 Ibid.

22 Castells, Manuel, The Power of Identity, 2nd ed. (West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010).

23 Matin, Abdul, “Informationalism,” in The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology, 2nd ed, ed Ritzer, George and Rojek, Chris, (London: Wiley, 2020). (Gillian Kane: Project Manager).

24 Shah, A. M., The Family in India: Critical Essays (New Delhi: Orient Longman Pvt. Ltd, 1998).

25 Castells, op. cit.

26 Rahman (1966: 80—81) has pointed out that the administration of the law was car­ried on in the courts by the qazis appointed by the state. They were drawn from the ranks of the ‘Ulama’. Qazis could be used as instruments of the ruler’s will. In every age, beginning with the early Umayyad times, we read recurring condemnations of the qazis by pious ‘Ulama’ and jurists, later on above all by the Sufis, many of whom refused to accept governmental offices, holding that their integrity was thereby in danger of being compromised. Besides these law courts, the Caliphs held special courts called the mazalim courts for the redress of personal wrongs, usually as courts of higher appeal against the decisions of lower courts and officials of the administration.

27 Muslim elites used to be mainly concentrated in cities and towns viz. Ajmer, Bangalore, Calcutta, Chennai, Delhi, Deoband, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kanpur, Lucknow, Moradabad, Saharanpur and Varanasi. Muslim masses, however, used to be concentrated in rural India, where a majority of them used to derive their livelihood from agriculture either as agricultural laborers, poor peasants, middle peasants, rich peasants, ex-landlords or rural artisans. There is an urgent need for a survey for capturing these nuances to know the magnitude and scale of de-peasan- tization of Muslims in rural India and its estimation if not the actual size of these groups and its association with Ashraf, Atraf and Arzal. Changing power relations among AAAs in contemporary rural India, especially after the introduction of the statutory panchayats, are undergoing change from A¹ to A² and A³. Matin and Parvez have examined the process of social exclusion and marginalization among Muslims in India, especially in rural areas. See, Matin, Abdul, “Marginalization of Muslims in Rural India: Tentative Observations,” The Eastern Anthropologist 62, no. 2 (2009): 265—272; Parvez, Mahfuz, “Historical Process of Marginalization: The Case of Indian-Bengali Muslims,” Historicus/Quarterly Journal of Pakistan Historical Society LIX no. 2 (April-June 2011). https://www.academia.edu/8150506/ Research-west-bengal-muslim_Final

The first quarter of the 21st century is witnessing a revival of the UCC. The demand for codification may be contextualized under three dimensions of (a) plural­ism as opposed to Monism among Muslims of India, (b) gender justice and (c) urban Muslim elite leadership under the hegemony of Ashrafs and its declining influence among the Ajlafs and Atrafs.

28 Noorjehan Safia, Niaz, Women's Shariah Court-Muslim Women's Quest for Justice: An Alternative Dispute Resolution Forum for and by Muslim Women (Chennai: Notion Press, 2016).

29 Government of India. Law Commission of India, Consultation Paper on Reform of Family Law (New Delhi: The Ministry of Law and Justice, 31 August 2018). http:// www.lawcommissionofindia.nic.in/reports/CPonReformFamilyLaw.pdf

30 Kokal, Kalindi, State Law, Dispute Processing, and Legal Pluralism: Unspoken Dialogues from Rural India (London: Routledge, 2020).

31 Government of India Cabinet Secretariat. Sachar Committee, Prime Minister's High Level Committee for Preparation of Report on Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community of India (New Delhi: Government of India, November, 2006). http://www.minorityaffairs.gov.in/sites/default/files/sachar_comm.pdf

32 Sen, Amartya, The Idea ofJustice (London: Penguin Books, 2010).