The first uniform civil code in independent India could have been an opportunity to showcase a progressive template for other states. It ought to have restricted itself to marriage, divorce, maintenance, adoption and inheritance—areas governed by personal laws that create discrepancy among citizens. Instead, the state of Uttarakhand has taken on the role of Morality Police by inserting a clause that requires couples cohabitating together to register on an online portal.

There’s a 16-page form, liability on landlords and certification by a religious leader that the couple is eligible to marry should they so desire. It’s an odd requirement for a law that is supposedly secular. Interfaith couples who already find it tough to marry because of existing so-called anti conversion laws in eight states will now find it tough to even live together.

Invoking the 2022 murder of Shradha Walker allegedly by her live-in boyfriend Aaftab Poonawala, chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said the live-in clause was to prevent such a crime from taking place again.

Umm, how exactly? Recalling a gruesome murder makes for a strong emotional pitch but the argument about protection is weak, to put it mildly, for several reasons.

Data from around the world, tells us that every 10 minutes a woman or girl is killed not by a stranger........

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