The necessity or otherwise of a uniform civil code cannot be debated in the absence of a coherent conception of what the UCC will be and what it will do. Although it has urged the government to enact one, the Supreme Court's own judgments reveal the hollowness in its understanding of the UCC. Perhaps, uniformity itself is no answer to the myriad problems of religion-based personal laws.
The growing protest against temples that deny access to menstruating women should also challenge the institutionalisation of faith and the mediating power of the priest.
A committee headed by Justice J S Verma constituted to examine the teaching of fundamental duties in institutions of learning submitted a comprehensive report in 1999. This essay examines the recommendations in the broad context of the ongoing debate on social science curriculum in schools, focusing on the manner in which some of the contested issues within citizenship theory have been explored.
An honourable judge of the Supreme Court has recently observed that the Constitution is more important than a popular mandate. That is all very well, but is the Constitution more important than the mandate of the World Trade Organisation? This is a tough nut to crack, and one the authorities are most reluctant to crack on their own.
