Law as an Instrument of Social Change: The Feminist Dilemma

Abstract

Legal reforms have been at the centre of the agenda for strategizing gender justice in India. This has been so, right from the time of nine-teenth century social reforms movements, through the period of nationalist struggles, down to the contemporary women's movement. In more recent times, this reliance on the efficacy of law and legal reforms to initiate changes in the social order towards a gender just and egalitarian society gets voiced in what might be termed the first comprehensive document marking the contemporary feminist movement in India, i.e. the Report of the Committee on the Status of Women in India. The committee viewed legislation as one of the. major instruments for ushering in changes in the social order in the post-colonial state. Legislation, it was felt, can 'act directly as a norm setter, or indirectly, providing institutions which accelerate social change by making it more acceptable'.