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Delhi High Court Legalizes Homosexuality In India
Sanjukta Basu
History has been created today in India, this morning Delhi High Court gave its judgment on the petition filed by Naz Foundation challenging the constitutionality of Section 377 of IPC which criminalizes all acts of oral and anal sex between individuals irrespective of age and consent.
High Court ruled in favour of the petition and said,
We declare that Section 377 IPC, insofar it criminalises consensual sexual acts of adults in private, is violative of Articles 21, 14 and 15 of the Constitution. The provisions of Section 377 IPC will continue to govern non-consensual penile non-vaginal sex and penile non-vaginal sex involving minors. By 'adult' we mean everyone who is 18 years of age and above. A person below 18 would be presumed not to be able to consent to a sexual act.
The religious groups have already started reacting negatively. They say this is a sad day for civilised people. May their God help them.
The politicians are quiet and the Law minister said he would react after reading the judgment.
The road ahead is still long, the next struggles would be about homosexuals couple's property rights, adoption rights, marriage rights, domestic violence in intimate relations etc.
I have written more about this case earlier here.
A more detailed report in the making.
Delhi High Court Legalizes Homosexuality In India
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Sam
July 2, 2009
04:59 AM
I guess a big congratulations to the Naz Foundation for achieving what they set out to(that too without being nasty or rude on the internet and not indulging in self pity). May their God bless them!
Slime
URL
July 2, 2009
05:18 AM
Sanjukta,
you are aligned with lawyers collective and you fought for this. so the victory is yours and lawyer fraternity.
as lawyers collective as also responsible for creating domestic violence law, will it advising the government to revist all laws that define relationships thus removing gender biasness completely? it surely cant be a piecemeal approach but needs complete re visitation.
psingh
July 2, 2009
05:29 AM
why are some people upset i dunno.
why do we need a law to 'legalize' this.
isnt it common sense that if 2 adult men want to penetrate each others buttocks in the privacy of their bedrooms, then its not the concern of the state.
Vinod Joseph
July 2, 2009
06:15 AM
Sanjukta, tell me, will this ruling have any impact outside Delhi? What happens if a different High Court, say the High Court of Madhya Pradesh, takes a different view? Do you know if NAZ Foundation has any strategy to get this ruling affirmed by the Supreme Court? Is the Government of India likely to scrap S.377 from the IPC?
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