Marrying cross cousins to be prohibited in UCC- Opinions

Marrying cross cousins is a prominent practice in South India, except for Kerala. It has been seen for centuries and many of our movies in the last decade have romanticized marrying cross-cousins as a norm. There are folklores that are extrapolated with Mahabharatha like 'Sashirekha Parinayam', written during the Vijayanagara Empire where Abhimanyu married Sashirekha, his first cousin. Many of our ancestor dynasties - Chola, Chera, Pandya, Pallava, Wadayar, Vijayanagara, Travancore, Kakathiya, Rashtrakuta etc., have had the practice in agrarian families.

I have had bitter experiences with north Indians disgusting the practice - I understand that it has its cons as per scientific studies. A random keyboard warrior had it in him to call me an inbred pervert - for my family like many Kapu families have had preferable marriages between two 'viyyapu' families for generations - 9 to be precise. But science is not the root of their disgust, the root is their conditioning to shame marrying cousins and use of racist slurs towards Muslims for doing it - muslims marry parallel cousins too, which I find uncomfortable to digest, but scientifically a cousin is a cousin. I feel that northies carry a moral superiority for not having such practice.

The UCC passed in Utharakand prohibits marrying relatives, especially close cousins. In the UCC that BJP aims to introduce, they apparently intend to prohibit the practice of marrying cousins. Their motto is to use the emotion of demeaning Muslims for doing so, for their own political gain.

My take, yes, social practices that pose greater harm should be rectified. But how? By shaming people for following a practice or by spreading awareness? How many state-sponsored advertisements do we see that spread awareness about genetic diseases? How many hoardings do we see?

I remember in 2004-05, when AIDS was rampant, every serial in DD had some aspect where they purposefully put in a scene or two about AIDS and the usage of Condoms. Same for Polio, MRP (jago grahak jago/ meluko viniyogadharuda meluko in telugu), TB vaccines etc.

If the motive is to eradicate genetic disorders, should the state take steps around it like more billboards, introduction in school syllabi, promote genetic compatibility test labs etc., or should they randomly pass a law that prohibits a cultural preference, coupled with their trolls shaming others left, right and centre, their leaders promoting usage of racist slur etc?

What is your take?

PS: Marrying a cousin is not valid even under the current Hindu Marriage act.