1078 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Is not the Shariat now applicable to the Punjab ?
Sardar B. S. Man : I am splitting up the Punjab population into two distinct groups : one group comprises 95 per cent. of the population and the other remaining five per cent. The 95 per cent., and in fact even more, live in the villages and is attached to the land.......
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Was not Shariat passed in undivided India ?
Sardar B. S. Man : I shall come to the Punjab laws. There the custom is the primary rule of decision to the exclusion of Shariat as well as the Hindu Law,
Dr. Ambedkar : That has been overruled by the Shariat law.
Sardar B. S. Man : Shariat will fill in the gap when there is no customary law prevalent. It is quite distinct. I must refer to that later since I do not want my argument interrupted now. We have legislation— the Punjab Laws Act of 1872, clause 5—where it is distinctly laid down that in Punjab the first rule of decision will be the customary law and where there is no custom and a gap arises only then the Hindu law or the Shariat law will come in.
Shri R. C. Upadhyaya (Rajasthan) : Are the customs reduced to writing ?
Sardar B. S. Man : Not only, reduced to writing but compiled, listened to and decided—not for ten or fifteen years but for ages.
An Hon. Member : Is not your custom the same as Hindu custom ?
Sardar B. S. Man : What innocence ! If I were to prove to my friend here that my custom is entirely and fundamentally different from Hindu law, will he be prepared to make an exception ?
Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : If a custom is reasonable. Dr. Ambedkar is bound to accept it ( Interruption ) .
Sardar B. S. Man : The interruptions are many. Interruptor says that if I convince him he is bound to accept it. I do not know whether I can convince a person who is not willing to be convinced : Dr. Ambedkar says, even if he is convinced he will not accept it.
Now, let me give a quotation from Mayne’s Hindu Law ; it has held the field for a fairly long time and is a fairly authoritative commentary. It says:
“As regards the Village Communities, the Punjab and the adjoining districts are the region in which alone they flourish in their primitive rigour. This is the tract which the Aryans must have