DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 761
- HINDU CODE— contd
Mr. Speaker : The motion that the House was considering was:
“That the Bill to amend and codify certain branches of the Hindu Law, as reported by the Select Committee, be taken into consideration.”
- The Honourable Shri Jawaharlal Nehru (Prime Minister) : Sir I crave your leave and the indulgence of the House to make a statement in regard to the Hindu code Bill and I trust that the Statement I make will meet the approval of the House.
When at the commencement of this Session, I referred in the course of my remarks to the Hindu Code Bill, I said that Government attached a great deal of importance to this measure and they hoped that this consideration stage would be passed during this session. At the same time Government were very well aware that there was a variety of opinion on this subject and a large number of people were interested in the provisions of this Bill. And, therefore, I had suggested then that we propose to follow a course which we hoped would lead to a broadbased agreement in regard to a number of controversial clauses in the Bill. I should like now to amplify that statement and to make clear the policy of Government in regard to this matter. We have had fairly prolonged debate on this Bill, not only in this session but in previous sessions. We had set aside two days on this occasion and as the House knows, those days have been prolonged on two occasions. Government had no desire and have no desire to restrict debate on an important measure of this kind and in spite of the fact that we have been very hard pressed for time—and we have very important legislative measures awaiting disposal during this session—we extended the debate on two occasions and indeed to day was also fixed for it.
While we have no such desire to restrict this debate, naturally Government is hard put to it to find more and more time, still we are prepared to find more time because of the importance of the measure and the desire of some Members of the House. But there was another aspect to this question and that was this; that if we are going to consider this matter in a spirit of trying to find an agreement as far as possible, in regard to controversial clauses, if, as I said we are going to proceed on the lines I indicated right at the commencement, then it is desirable for us at this stage to carry on this debate and
- C.A. (Leg.) D., Vol. VII, Part II, 19th December 1949, pp. 783-85.