Caste Disabilities Removal Act, 1850

This very short 1850 Act protects a person's property and inheritance rights when they change their religion or lose their caste, by stopping courts from enforcing any law or custom that would otherwise take away those rights as a punishment for that change.

The Act's single substantive section states that any law or usage then in force within the territories governed by the East India Company that would cause someone to forfeit rights or property, or that would impair their right of inheritance, because they renounced or were excluded from a religion, or lost their caste, would no longer be enforced as law in the Company's courts or in courts established by Royal Charter in those territories.

The Act's preamble explains it was meant to extend, across all the Company's territories, a principle that had previously applied only in the Bengal Code -- namely, that in a civil suit between parties of different religious persuasions (Hindu, Muslim, or other), the religious law of either party would not be applied in a way that deprived them of property they would otherwise be entitled to.

This is a very old statute (1850) predating Pakistan's independence, and the extract's footnotes show it was later amended for West Pakistan in 1963. It remains a foundational anti-discrimination protection regarding inheritance and religious conversion, though its precise current scope should be checked against later provincial amendments.