Hindu Law: Beyond Tradition and Modernity

This intensively researched book argues that Hindu Law is an essentially flexible and constantly evolving system, that scholars have wrongly proclaimed it dead and merely a relic of an ancient past. The author contends that Hindu Law is very much alive and playing a role even in the current post-modern environment as is apparent in the way the courts themselves interpret various aspects of law, including the rules of inheritance, marriage, maintenance, and divorce. He also suggests that it would be wrong to see this law as uniformly oppressive. Wide in scope, the book examines the development of Hindu law from the ancient period, through it drastic remolding in the colonial era, to its emergence as a postmodern entity.

• Author is among most distinguished experts on the subject.
• Important material on gender issues and family law.
• Original research and scholarship.
• Lucid and accessible writing.

Abbreviations
Preface
Part I: Historical and conceptual background
1:Introduction
2:Rising from the Ashes: Postmodern Hindu Law
3:Antecedents and Concepts of Traditional Hindu Law
4:The Post-classical Evolution of Hindu Law and its Colonial Distortions
5:Origins of Modernity in Hindu Law: Emerging Discourses on Reforms and Codification
6:Contesting Modernity: Postcolonial Evolution Of Hindu Law
7:Transcending Modernity: The Postmodern Reconstruction Of Hindu Law
Part II: Substantive Hindu Law Beyond Tradition And Modernity
8:Hindu Marriage Law
9:Child Marriage
10:Polygamy
11:Divorce
12:Maintenance
Part III: Concluding Analysis
13:Postmodernity and Beyond
Table of Cases
List of Statutes
Bibliography
Index