How the Solicitor General’s Clarification on Hindu Law Sources and Parliamentary Approval of Relationship Prohibitions Implicates Constitutional Equality and Legislative Authority

The Solicitor General of India, Tushar Mehta, publicly asserted that the widely held belief that Hindu law is derived directly from the ancient Manusmriti is incorrect, emphasizing instead the distinct historical foundations of the current personal law regime. He clarified that the predominant school of Hindu law governing inheritance and family matters across most of the country is the Mitakshara school, which finds its doctrinal basis not in the Manusmriti but in the Yajnavalkya Smriti, an older legal text. According to his statement, the Mitakshara school has been the prevailing legal framework since before the seventh century AD, and it characteristically grants inheritance rights by virtue of birth, thereby establishing a lineage‑based entitlement that has endured through centuries of legal evolution. Contrastingly, he noted that the Dayabhaga school, which continues to operate in the eastern states of Bengal and Assam, adopts a more restrictive approach to inheritance, limiting rights in a manner that diverges from the birth‑based entitlement of the Mitakshara tradition. He further pointed out that the ancient wisdom encapsulated in these schools also delineated prohibited degrees of relationship for marriage, a set of restrictions that has been formally approved by the Parliament, indicating legislative endorsement of these traditional norms. The parliamentary approval of relationship prohibitions suggests that the legislature has exercised its authority to codify certain aspects of personal law that originate in ancient jurisprudential texts, thereby blending historical doctrine with contemporary statutory validation. This confluence of historical textual sources and modern legislative action raises substantive questions concerning the role of ancient Smritis as a source of law in a constitutional democracy that guarantees equality and non‑discrimination, especially when personal law provisions impact gendered rights. Given the Solicitor General’s clarification about the actual textual foundations of Hindu law, the legal community is prompted to reassess the interpretative weight afforded to the Manusmriti in judicial pronouncements, statutory constructions, and policy debates concerning personal law reforms.

One important legal question is whether Parliament, by formally approving the prohibited degrees of relationship that stem from ancient Smriti traditions, has exercised a valid exercise of its constitutional authority to legislate on matters of personal law, given that personal law traditionally falls within the ambit of religious and customary norms, and whether such legislative action must satisfy the constitutional test of rationality and non‑discrimination. The constitutional analysis would also require examining whether the statutory recognition of these prohibitions aligns with the principle of substantive equality, especially in contexts where the prohibited degrees intersect with marriage choices that affect both genders.

Perhaps the more significant constitutional issue that emerges from the Solicitor General’s remarks concerns the compatibility of inheritances granted by birth under the Mitakshara school and the more restrictive inheritance regime of the Dayabhaga school with the equality clause enshrined in the Constitution, particularly as these regimes may result in differential treatment of women, thereby inviting potential challenges on the ground of gender discrimination. In evaluating such statutes, courts may be called upon to balance deference to legislative judgment with the need to ensure that any reliance on ancient textual norms does not perpetuate systemic bias that contravenes constitutional guarantees of equal protection.

Another possible legal angle relates to the interpretative approach courts might adopt when confronted with statutes that reference the ancient Yajnavalkya Smriti or other traditional texts, and whether the Parliament’s explicit approval of relationship prohibitions signals a legislative intent to give these texts a codified status that overrides any contrary common‑law evolution.

A further question that may arise in judicial forums is whether a court could review the parliamentary approval of relationship prohibitions on the basis that reliance on centuries‑old doctrinal sources, without contemporary empirical justification, may infringe the principle of reasonableness under the constitutional guarantee of due process.

Finally, the interplay between the stated historical foundations of Hindu law and the modern legislative endorsement may shape the trajectory of personal law reform initiatives, as lawmakers and reform advocates would need to navigate the delicate balance between respecting cultural heritage embodied in ancient Smritis and fulfilling constitutional imperatives of equality, individual autonomy, and non‑discrimination.