Advancing the Women-Led Development Model, Pg10

Key Highlights:

• The National Commission for Women (NCW) recently held a consultation on women's property rights and access to justice, aiming to advance a women-led development model.
• The discussion emphasized shifting from welfare-based compensatory justice to rights-based distributive justice for women's empowerment.
• The Indian Constitution, particularly Articles 38, 39, and 46 (Directive Principles), prioritizes distributive justice to ensure equitable resource distribution.
• Landmark Supreme Court judgments, including Air India Statutory Corporation v. United Labour Union (1996) and Consumer Education and Research Centre v. Union of India (1995), have reinforced distributive justice as a constitutional goal.
• The Hindu Succession Act, 1956, with its 2005 amendment, grants daughters equal coparcenary rights in ancestral property, a principle upheld in Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma (2020).
• Despite legal safeguards, patriarchal mindsets, lack of legal awareness, and limited access to justice hinder women's property rights.
• The concept of "women-led development" advocates for women as active drivers of change, moving beyond their role as passive beneficiaries.

Detailed Insights:

• The NCW consultation highlighted the need for inclusive growth to be sustainable, linking women's empowerment to the national goal of Viksit Bharat@2047.
• Current approaches to women's empowerment, often confined to welfare schemes and reservations, are seen as compensatory justice, which is deemed insufficient for accelerated national progress.
• Distributive justice, rooted in socialist principles, ensures equitable access to resources and opportunities, aligning with the constitutional vision.
• Article 21 of the Constitution, guaranteeing the right to life and human dignity, has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to include socio-economic and distributive justice.
• Compensatory justice is exemplified by constitutional provisions like Articles 17 (abolition of untouchability) and 23 (prohibition of human trafficking), and statutory compensation for victims under Section 396 of the Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita.
• Property ownership significantly enhances women's social status, bargaining power, and overall capabilities.
• Article 300-A ensures that no person, irrespective of gender, shall be deprived of property except by authority of law, aiming for substantive equality.
• The 2005 amendment to the Hindu Succession Act, 1956, was a revolutionary step to remove gender discriminatory provisions, granting daughters equal rights as sons in coparcenary property by birth.
• The Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma (2020) judgment clarified the retrospective application of the 2005 amendment, affirming daughters' coparcenary rights from birth regardless of their father's survival status at the time of the amendment.
• Other laws like the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, and the Special Marriage Act, 1954, also contribute to strengthening women's legal position regarding property.
• To achieve women-led development, measures include digitizing land records, simplifying mutation procedures, ensuring automatic recording of women's shares, and enhancing legal literacy through Self-Help Groups.

Key Concepts Involved:

• Distributive Justice: Fair allocation of resources, opportunities, and benefits within society based on needs, abilities, and contributions.
• Compensatory Justice: Rectifying past wrongs or harms by providing restitution or compensation to those who have suffered loss.
• Women-led Development: A paradigm shift recognizing women as active agents and drivers of social and cultural transformation, not just beneficiaries.
• Coparcenary Rights: The right of a person to ancestral property by birth in a Hindu Undivided Family.