Union Minister Sanjeev Balyan to embark on a 4-day padayatra to drum up support for UCC

Union Minister of State for Animal Husbandry Sanjeev Balyan will embark on a four-day kanwar yatra Tuesday morning from Haridwar to “drum up support for the Uniform Civil Code and its implementation in the country”.

Balyan’s yatra will be flagged off by Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami whose government appointed a committee last year to seek views on the implementation of the Uniform Civil Code in the hill state. The Dhami government-constituted expert panel has completed its deliberations and is likely to submit its report anytime this month.

In the upper Indo-Gangetic plains, the Kanwar Yatra is an annual pilgrimage of the devotees of Shiva who carry the holy Ganga water on foot from Haridwar to their native place.

Balyan would be walking with the water for four days from Haridwar to his constituency in Muzaffarnagar in western UP seeking support on UCC, a potential electoral issue for the BJP in the next Lok Sabha polls in 2024.

“People carry the holy water and pray to God for the fulfillment of their wish. I will do the same to seek blessings for the people of my constituency and for the implementation of a Uniform Civil Code;” Balyan told DH.

The Law Commission last month had written to all stakeholders seeking their views on the issue two years after a panel consultation paper had called UCC undesirable.

Balyan would be walking through Uttarakhand for two days before his yatra enters UP where he would be received by state BJP chief Bhupender Chaudhary on Thursday.