646 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
sake of the children and it was therefore, that Sir Henry Maine introduced a Bill which ultimately emerged as the Special Marriage Act of 1872. That this Act has catered not only for the Brahmo community but for a much larger body is testified to by the fact that after the passing of the Act several amendments have been sought in order to make it applicable to other sections and in order also to obviate certain objections to particular sections of the Act. In doing so, these people at different times acted as the representatives of the conscience of the society—the minority conscience, let us say. But the minority has a conscience; and the social conscience of the minority also must be respected. In every country we find that it is the minority conscience which has always come to the help of law for the purpose of vindicating its own view. Well, Sir, today we do not know which section is in the minority and which section in the majority. But it goes without saying that in a democratic form of government all sections of people must necessarily have their consciences vindicated, and their ways of life and thought, at least so far as fundamental points are concerned, respected. In that view the question that really has to be solved by us is this : Is this Bill in any particular respect imposing itself upon the conscience of any particular section? (Babu Ramnarayan Singh : Yes) And by that will its excellence or otherwise be tested.
Now, if we come to the first part of the Bill, so far as the question relating to marriage, divorce, judicial separation, guardianship, alimony, custody of children and so on, is concerned, so far as I can understand, it cannot possibly be contended that it is being thrust upon anyone. After all, it is only in those cases where you find that divorce has become absolutely unavoidable that the provision will be utilised. And there are such cases, there can be no question whatsoever about that. There are cases where continuance of the marriage bond will really lead to misery from the point of view of both parties, will lead to disintegration of the family. It is only there that divorce can possibly come on.
Sjt. Rohini Kumar Chaudhuri (Assam : General) : May I ask if the subsequent marriages become happy? They become worse.
Shri L. Krishnaswami Bharathi (Madras : General) : It depends upon the lady you marry!
Dr. P. K. Sen : I am not going into that question because in that case it would be a matter of statistics as to how many cases have really become happy or how many cases have really become happy