(*Some names have been changed to protect identity.)
It was 14 February 2023 — the valentine's day.
A bright yellow sun rose over the trees in a park in Uttarakhand's Pauri Garhwal district, and inside the park, on a bench in one corner, sat Aftab* and Pooja*.
The couple had met to celebrate their first valentine's day since 21-year-old Aftab expressed his love to a 19-year-old Pooja when they met each other in college in September 2022.
"It was early in the day and the park was relatively empty. We were talking when I realised that somebody was watching us from a distance. A few minutes later, men with saffron shawl came and started questioning us. They took photos of our Aadhaar cards and asked for the contacts of our family members. We quickly realised that they were Bajrang Dal goons," Aftab recalled.
After a brief pause, he continued, "We had heard stories of such vigilantes harassing couples on valentine's day. That day we faced it (harassment) first hand. Now, with this new law, they have been given the power to harass couples all year round."
Aftab was referring the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) Bill passed by the Uttarakhand state assembly on Wednesday, 7 February. With this, it became the first state in India to implement a UCC, which presents common law for marriage, divorce, and inheritance of property among other areas.
While several aspects of the Bill came under public scrutiny, the provisions for regulation of live-in relationships drew specific attention. The Bill requires couples to register their relationships, lays down provisions for intimation to parents of applicants, and imposes penalties for non-registration.
While this is the first time that live-in relationships are being recognised by the State in India, young couples like Aftab and Pooja believe that in a "conservative" society which frowns upon live-in relationships, the new law will become a tool for vigilante groups to target couples, especially those which fall in intercaste, interfaith, or same-sex categories.
The Fine Print
The Uttarakhand UCC defines a live-in relationship as "relationship between a man and a woman who cohabit in a shared household through a relationship in the nature of marriage."
Section 378 of the Bill mandatorily requires the partners in a live-in relationship to submit a 'statement' (application for registration of the relationship) to the Registrar.
On receiving the application, the Registrar will register the statement unless the partners are within the prohibited degrees of relationship or the partners are minor (less than 18 years of age) or the consent of one of the partners was obtained by force, coercion, undue influence, misrepresentation or fraud.
Further, Section 385(1) of the Bill states that, after receiving the statement for registration, the Registrar shall intimate the parents of the partners in the live-in relationship, if the applicants are under 21 years of age.
The Bill also makes non-registration of live-in relationships a punishable offence. Section 387 states that if partners in a live-in relationship for more than a month do not apply for its registration, then they are liable for imprisonment for a term extending three months, and will attract a fine of upto Rs 10,000.
UCC and a Hindu State
Set in the foothills of the Himalayas, Uttarakhand is a Hindu-majority state. As per the 2011 census Hindus comprise four-fifth of its population of approximately one crore people.
The state also has a large migrant population.
Indresh Maikhuri, the Uttarakhand State Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist Leninist) ascribed the largely Hindu nature of the state as the reason behind the implementation of the UCC.
"They (BJP) have a clear majority in the state Assembly and Uttarakhand is a largely Hindu state. Tribes have anyway been exempted from the Bill. Uttarakhand, thus, was a good lab to test the implementation of UCC because they will hardly face any opposition," Maikhuri said.
"What business does the government have inquiring about adult personal relationships?" he questioned.
The CPI(ML) leader also questioned the intent behind the Bill. "The first U in UCC is for 'Uniform'. Today Uttarakhand has a UCC, tomorrow Assam will have its own UCC, then other states will follow. How can UCC, which is supposed to be uniform, have different versions in different states? Why have they exempted the Tribes? It's quite clear who the Bill is for," he said.
Privacy Concerns
"The provisions governing live-in relationships in the Uttarakhand UCC violate the fundamental Right to Privacy," Delhi-based advocate Soutik Banerjee told The Quint.
"...but unfortunately while privacy is a guaranteed fundamental right under Article 21 of the Indian constitution, that is just the jurisprudence of it. The on-ground implementation will happen when there is a statutory framework. But there is no political will to design that framework," Banerjee added.
Over 211 km from Pauri Garhwal, in Dehradun, 24-year-old Ranu* — a trans woman — is in a queer relationship with Sunita* (22), their partner of four years. "We haven't told our parents yet and we don't know when will we be ready to come out to our parents and the society. But now, if we want to live together, we will have to come out to the government," said Ranu.
*Ranu and Sunita* grew up in a thinly populated Dehradun neighbourhood. "We always felt attracted to each other but when we grew up and came to terms with what it (attraction) meant, we knew that this (relationship) won't be acceptable to the society. The plan was to leave Uttarakhand and start a life elsewhere, probably in a big city like Delhi or Mumbai," Ranu added.
But moving cities won't allow Ranu and Sunita to escape the provisions of UCC. As per the draft, the Bill will be applicable to the "whole of the state of Uttarakhand and to the residents of Uttarakhand who reside outside its territories.
"The Bill's provisions regarding live-in relationships are extremely flawed from a privacy point of view. If the intent was to regularise live-in relationships to 'protect young couples especially women' as the state government is saying, then the Bill defeats that very purpose," said Lucknow-based advocate Areeb Uddin Ahmed who argued that the rules regarding live-in relationships are in contradiction with the judgment in the KS Puttaswamy vs Union of India Case.
"The Puttaswamy judgement ruled that the Right to Privacy is a fundamental right under the constitution of India. The bench also emphasised on the fact that sexual orientation is an essential facet of privacy. Under the new Bill, if queer couples want to reside together as live-in partners, they will have no option but to divulge details of their sexual orientation to the Registrar in the application," he added.
Soutik Banerjee, however, pointed out that the problem is not just limited to homosexual couples.
"This impacts intercaste, interfaith, and in fact, even heterosexual couples belonging to the same faith. The provisions under the UCC say that any person who gets to know about a live-in relationship can inform the Registrar. This is one step ahead of the Freedom of Religion laws where only the person who has converted or their parents can file the complaint. Basically RWAs and landlords will have a great time in addition to extra-State players," he said.
'They Have Reached Our Bedrooms'
"Any relationship between a man and a woman, which is not marriage, is looked at with suspicion in our society. Here, it's not like the big cities where we can walk hand-in-hand with our partners in the parks," said Aftab as he reflected on the provisions detailed in the Bill.
"...the difference is, earlier, we were being policed on the streets, now they've reached our bedrooms," he added.
Confusion and uncertainty regarding the future of their relationships occupy the minds of Aftab, Pooja, Ranu, Sunita, and several other young couples as they wait for a detailed framework of the Bill to come in.
"You think we are happy to elope? Or we don't want our parents to know about our relationships? But in some cases, we don't have a choice," said Ranu as she feared that this might be end of her and Sunita's big city dream.
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