Gangtok, May 16: The Sikkim government will bring in laws to ensure that women are treated at par with men with regards to inheritance rights and can seek 50 per cent as compensation from their husbands in case of divorce.

“We are drafting a bill that will bind a man to give 50 per cent of his property to his wife in the event of a divorce,” chief minister Pawan Chamling said here today while attending the statehood day celebrations at Chintan Bhavan. “The same bill will ensure that if a man brings home a second woman, 50 per cent of the husband’s property has to be given to the wife if she files for a divorce,” the chief minister said.

The bill is being prepared by the law department and will be tabled in the next Assembly session, he added.

Chamling also announced that the government will issue a notification soon to give equal property rights to sons and daughters.

“This will protect the girl child. No one has approached us for these rights but it is an initiative on the part of the government to give proportionate rights to our women,” Chamling said. Sikkim currently has 40 percent reservation for women in panchayat and municipal bodies.

Welcoming the decision, former chairperson of the state women’s commission, Manita Pradhan, said that it was a positive move by the government. She said in case of divorce because of a man’s polygamy, the wife gets only Rs 500 under the Criminal Procedure Code. “This is a very meagre amount. But now she will be protected and will be able to claim 50 per cent of the man’s property (even) if she files a polygamy case against him,” Pradhan said.

A lawyer who deals with divorce cases here said compensations usually vary from case to case and according to the financial ability of the husband. “But in some cases 50 percent had been awarded,” the lawyer, not wanting to be named, said.

Contacted in Calcutta, Gitanath Ganguly, the executive president of Legal Aid Services, West Bengal, said it seemed the “the Sikkim government’s aim is to keep the institution of the family intact”.

“It is a good law but will be a personal law meant only for the Sikkimese. However, corruption may creep in with women taking advantage of the law and seeking divorce to remarry again,” Ganguly said, adding that the law was not new. “A similar law exists in Goa.”