As we have seen, the debates about women's inheritance and marriage laws were brought to the foreground by women themselves as early as the 1930s and climaxed in the passage of the Hindu Code Bills in 1956. The discussion spanned a 15-year period and occurred in three different parliaments: the federal parliament, the provisional parliament and the first elected parliament of India. The debates, both within the legislature/parliament and in the public life of the new nation (for example, in feature films, novels and newspaper debates), about the real and imagined consequences of passing the proposed Hindu code into law, constitute a major milestone in post-independence India. It revealed that entrenched patriarchal interests, despite stating their commitment to women's equality, revealed great hostility to translating these into substantive legal provisions.

Is Uniformity Equal to Gender Justice?

The Constituent Assembly (consisting of 15 women in an assembly of 299), which assured women that they would not be discriminated against on the grounds of sex, nevertheless provided exactly such a possibility in the name of religious freedom, which allowed for the continuance of religion-based personal laws. Although the freedom of religion is strictly subject to the fundamental rights listed in part three of the Indian constitution, and also provides for social reform, it was seen as setting a limit on individual freedoms. B. R. Ambedkar, as a framer of the constitution, protested in vain against the retention of personal laws: