Andhra
British rule in India introduced a more or less unified legal system in the continent. The quarter of a century following the takeover by the Crown, the governing of India from East India Company in 1858 was the major period of codification of law and consolidation of the court system in India.
During this period a series of Codes based on English law were enacted which were applicable throughout British India. By 1882, there was virtually complete codification of all fields of commercial, criminal and procedural law, except some aspects of personal law.
Regarding Personal Law,in order to prevail over the written law in British courts a custom must be proved to be immemorial or ancient, uniform, invariable, continuous, certain, notorious, reasonable, peaceful, obligatory and it must not be immoral to an express enactment or to public policy.
The British, with the help of local leaders like Veereshalingam Kandukuri of Andhra, Rammohan Roy of Bengal, etc., encouraged social reform and established firmly British-Indian law much against the local law, e.g., the local Indian customs prohibited divorce and widow remarriage, allowed child marriages and cultural and religious practices such as Sati of Rajasthan State (self immolation of a widowed wife in Rajasthan), but the British-Indian law allowed divorce and remarriage, prohibited child marriages, and banned the practice of Sati!
Introduction of 'stare decisis' diminished the flexibility of Brahminical Hindu law. Slowly the Brahminical law was completely ignored and dependence on the judicial precedent and legislation took over the legal system.
The fact remains that India has no single continent-wide system of caste, kinship, religion, economic activity or land tenure.
But now there is an all-India legal system, which handles local disputes in accordance with uniform Indian standards based mainly on Common Law.
And you state 1956!!
I sound more Indian than you!!
Now that's a really disgusting thought!!!