Uttarakhand: Muslim Concerns Over UCC Provisions Missing in State Congress Agenda

Dehradun: As the slugfest over ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and main opposition Congress over the contentious issue of newly implemented Uniform Civil Code (UCC) got underway during the ongoing Budget session of the Uttarakhand Assembly, the Congress protest interestingly mainly revolved round live-in relationships, completely ignoring the objections of the Muslim community regarding the alleged trampling of their religious rights guaranteed under the Constitution.    

While the Uttarakhand Congress held a march to the Assembly on Thursday, led by state unit chief Karan Mahara, against the provisions of compulsory registration of live-in relationships as per the UCC, the Muslim community felt the party tried to put their concerns under the carpet.

Notably, the worries of the Muslim community do not seem unfounded. The Uttarakhand Congress has decided to launch a two-month-long agitation and public referendum programme on the acceptability of live-in relationships, but it remains mum on provisions concerning the minorities, particularly Muslims. 

No state Congress leader was willing to commit anything on these concerns. Privately, the party leaders admit that state leadership has been scared of raising any issue that concerns the Muslims fearing a backlash from upper caste Hindu population, which forms the majority in Uttarakhand.   

The Congress also proposes to hold a referendum and has come up with a form with 15 questions that party workers will ask in a bid to evaluate public opinion. The party state unit President has claimed that by introducing UCC, the BJP government has legitimised live-in relationships, which is against the “ethos and culture” of Uttarakhand.  

The UCC has been challenged by various Muslims groups and individuals in the Nainital High Court on the grounds that it violates the religious freedom granted under the Constitution. Some individuals have also challenged the provisions of compulsory registration of live-in relations, citing the right to privacy.

While Congress has been shy of even talking or refereeing the cause of the minority Muslims, BJP and Sangh Parivar, as part of their long-term agenda of “Muslim bashing”, have been accused of trying to trample on Muslim Personal Laws guaranteed by Constitution. Even while piloting the UCC Bill, Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, the “young heart throb” of Hindutva forces, did not miss any opportunity to target Muslims by arguing that the Bill would protect girls like ‘Shraddha’ being killed by ‘Aftabs’.     

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On the protest by Uttarakhand Congress, Chief Minister Dhami said that live-in relationships have been recognised by the Supreme Court and the UCC only requires that such couples register to protect the girls and rights of offspring from such relationships.   

Uttarakhand has nearly 15% Muslim population, mostly residing in the Terai districts of Dehradun, Haridwar, Nainital and Udham Singh Nagar, which are politically significant. 

The Muslim community feels that despite getting substantial Muslim votes since the formation of the new state of Uttarakhand in 2000 in every election, Congress, which has ruled the state twice from 2002 till 2007 and from 2012 till 2017, has never done anything or stood up for the minority community when ‘Hindutva’ forces started targeting Muslims in an aggressive manner post 2014. 

There are two Congress Muslim legislators, namely, Furqan Ahmed from Piran Kaliyar and Qazi Nizammuddin from Mangalore, both from Haridwar district, but apart from highlighting the issues of their respective constituencies, they have never stood up for the Muslim community lest they be labelled “communal.”

Interestingly, when it comes to the “onslaught” of Hindutva forces against Muslims in Uttarakhand hills and their selective targeting  by accusing them of being involved in ‘Land Jehad’, ‘Love Jehad’, ‘Thook Jehad’ and ‘Mazar Jehad’ since 2017, the  Uttarakhand Congress, including its former Chief Minister Harish Rawat and senior party leaders, have preferred to look the other way. They perhaps fear that if they are seen standing with the Muslim cause, they would annoy the Hindu majority community.

The fact of the matter is that Congress has been wiped out completely in the last three consecutive Lok Sabha elections losing all the five seats. It also lost two consecutive Assembly elections to BJP in 2017 and 2022. The party got a thorough drubbing in the recently concluded civic elections where BJP, riding high on anti-Muslim rhetoric, won all the municipal corporation in the state.

Notably, instead of raising civic issues in the civic polls, Chief Minister Dhami was talking about implementing UCC, fighting various types of ‘jehads’ and “preserving the demography” of the state.

But when it comes to polling in the elections, the Congress party has been getting the majority of Muslim votes since the formation of Uttarakhand. The Haridwar Lok Sabha seat, which Harish Rawat represented and in 2024 his son was a candidate, had 30% Muslim votes, a majority of which were cast in their favour. Similarly, Muslim the vote percentage in the Nainital-Udham Singh Nagra Lok Sabha seat is 20%, while in Tehri Garhwal seat, it is 7%.

During the 2024 Lok Sabha poll, it was estimated that Muslims voted overwhelmingly for Congress. Harish Rawat, who has benefitted from Muslim votes, is yet to utter a word against the continuous targeting of Muslims in the hills of Uttarakhand, even though his daughter Anupama is a Congress legislator from Haridwar and got substantial Muslim votes.    

The Muslim community feels that Uttarakhand Congress leaders have taken Muslim votes for granted since they believe that the community has no alternative but to vote for them. In the initial years, after the formation of Uttarakhand, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) had presence in Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar districts among Muslims, Later, the community got disillusioned with BSP, since Congress and BJP emerged as the two dominant parties sharing power between them till 2017. However, with the advent of aggressive Hindutva politics, Congress has been marginalised in the upper Hindu caste majority state.

Congress leaders of Uttarakhand perhaps do not understand that by ignoring the core ideology of the party of taking every one along, particularly Dalits, downtrodden and Muslims, they would be further marginalised while BJP/RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) stick to aggressively working on their philosophy of Hindutva, combined with whipping up hate against the minorities, thereby gaining politically.  

There are Congress leaders who had been helping Muslim supporters of their respective areas, such as Sumit Hridayesh of Haldwani, who helped the community members in fighting the railway land encroachment case of Banphoolpura in the Supreme Court, and Suryakant Dhasmana, senior vice-president of party in Dehradun, who had stood through thick and thin with his supporters, irrespective of their religious affiliations. However, collectively, Uttarakhand Congress has always deserted their Muslim voters.

It seems that the Muslims of Uttarakhand have been left to fend for themselves in the absence of any political support. The community feels it has no option but to be prepared to fight for their own survival in the wake of continuous relentless economic, social, religious and political onslaught by the ruling BJP/Sangh Parivar.    

The writer is a freelancer based in Dehradun. The views expressed are personal.