Assam passes Uniform Civil Code bill

The Assam Assembly on Wednesday passed the Uniform Civil Code bill seeking to ban polygamy and make the registration of live-in relationships compulsory, even as the Opposition demanded that it should be sent to a select committee for scrutiny.

The passing of the 2026 Uniform Civil Code Bill paves the way for Assam to become the third state, after Uttarakhand and Gujarat, to introduce such a code after independence.

The Uniform Civil Code refers to a common set of laws governing marriage, divorce, succession and adoption for all citizens. Currently, such personal affairs of different religions are based on community-specific laws, largely derived from religious scripture.

On Wednesday, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that the tribal population in the state would be kept outside the purview of the Uniform Civil Code. “It does not interfere with the religious practices of any community or traditional practices of our indigenous”, he said on social media.

The code will override personal laws and will “ensure national integration by removing disparate loyalties to law, which have contracting ideologies”, Sarma added.

The bill was tabled in the Assembly on Monday, and was taken up for consideration and passing on Wednesday. It was introduced nearly two weeks after the proposed legislation was cleared by the state Cabinet on May 13.

Today, with the passage of...

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