‘The rules make it nearly impossible for couples, particularly interfaith ones, to live without oversight’
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On January 27, 2025, Uttarakhand became the first Indian State to implement the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), placing private relationships under state surveillance. The official claim is that it would restore gender justice, create “uniformity”, and address administrative oversight. However, when taken along with existing anti-conversion laws, this marks a coordinated legal push to segregate communities — not just in faith, but also in love and daily life. The UCC is the final blow, ensuring that all forms of interfaith relationships are regulated in the ‘New India’.
The introduction of more hurdles
Interfaith marriages already face immense social barriers. A survey (2014) of over 70,000 respondents found that fewer than 10% of urban Indians had a family member who married outside their caste. Interfaith unions were even rarer — barely 5% of urban respondents reported any marriages in their family outside their religion. The secular Special Marriage Act, 1954, has administrative hurdles, including a mandatory 30-day notice period, subjecting couples to scrutiny. Meanwhile, rigid anti-conversion laws, now enforced in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan, among several other States, have further criminalised religious conversion for marriage.
These laws create bureaucratic traps — as mandatory declarations, waiting periods, and district magistrate approvals — that deter conversions for marriage. Worse, they embolden vigilante groups, often linked to right-wing organisations, to justify harassment, policing, and violence against interfaith couples, particularly Hindu-Muslim. A news portal found that at least 63 of 101 police complaints invoking the U.P. anti-conversion law against Christians, were filed by third-party vigilante groups. Instead of protecting individuals, these laws provide legal cover for extrajudicial interventions, often with police complicity.
Against this background, the UCC’s provisions on live-in relationships take state scrutiny to a new extreme — even informal relationships are subject to surveillance. Live-in relationships are now legally required to be registered with district authorities. This includes a 16-page application with official documentation (Aadhaar cards, residential proof), seeking approval from “religious leaders or community heads,” and notifying family members. The registrar must inform the couple’s parents or guardians about their relationship. Failure to register is punishable with up to six months of imprisonment and a fine of ₹25,000.
These rules make it nearly impossible for couples, particularly interfaith ones, to live without oversight. It is no surprise, then, that only one live-in couple has successfully registered its relationship in Uttarakhand. Others have sought legal protection from the High Court, even as a Bajrang Dal leader claims to have sourced details on live-in applications. The ability of such vigilantes to interfere in private relationships underscores how the UCC and anti-conversion laws work in tandem to suppress interfaith unions.
A form of apartheid
The result is a complex legal machinery that is actively working to segregate communities, entrench religious divisions, and institutionalise a form of social apartheid: individuals cannot marry or even be in a relationship with the so-called ‘other’ without prior legal approval. These laws create barriers for interfaith couples at every stage whether in marriage or informal cohabitation.
This combined system functions in three ways.
First, by strengthening traditional religious institutions. The requirement for religious certification in both UCC and anti-conversion laws formalises the power of religious leaders over personal relationships in a secular democracy. This contradicts the constitutional guarantee of individual freedom, reinforcing the idea that relationships must adhere to religious and community norms rather than personal choice.
Second, by enabling families to exercise greater control over women. Both laws disproportionately impact women, who often face pressure, coercion, or even violent punishment for engaging in interfaith and inter-caste relationships. By notifying families of live-in relationships, the UCC makes women more vulnerable to honour-based violence and familial control. Women in interfaith relationships are often framed as victims of manipulation, stripping them of agency and reinforcing patriarchal control over their choices.
Third, by providing legal cover for vigilantism. Right-wing vigilantes now have a legal framework to monitor, report, and harass interfaith couples, married and unmarried, under the guise of preserving tradition and the law. When an interfaith couple attempts to register a live-in relationship or convert for marriage, vigilante groups are often the first to know, due to the legal requirement of public notices and family notifications.
Amid rising hate speech and polarisation, these laws effectively legalise and entrench the separation of religious communities, preventing interfaith interaction at all levels. Similar to the apartheid-era South Africa or Nazi Germany, which banned inter-racial unions, the effect of the UCC and anti-conversion laws is to institutionalise segregation by making interfaith relationships, whether marital or informal, almost impossible.
It could be catching on
Looking ahead, Uttarakhand’s UCC could be a blueprint for other States. Rajasthan’s High Court recently considered mandatory registration of live-in relationships, closely following Uttarakhand’s model. The Rajasthan Assembly enacted an anti-conversion law. Gujarat is also contemplating a draft UCC modelled on similar lines. These legal trends point toward a broader movement toward a systematic regulation of personal relationships.
In India, love and faith are deeply personal and subjective experiences that each individual defines on their own terms. These legal developments not only threaten individual rights but also undermine the very fabric of India’s pluralistic society.
Nidah Kaiser is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Politics and International Studies at SOAS University of London, London. Sabah Gurmat is an independent journalist and researcher based in New Delhi
Published – February 25, 2025 12:08 am IST