A general view of Supreme Court.
| Photo Credit: Shashi Shekhar Kashyap
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a series of petitions seeking to criminalise marital rape on Thursday (October 17, 2024).
The petitioners have argued that protection given to non-consensual sexual acts by a man with his own wife violated women’s right to bodily integrity, autonomy, and dignity.
However, a recent affidavit filed by the Centre said punishment of non-consensual sexual acts in wedlock and categorising it as rape would impact conjugal relationship and lead to “serious disturbances” in the institution of marriage.
The petitions seek to strike down Exception 2 of Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The provision excludes non-consensual sexual intercourse by a husband with his wife, if the latter is over fifteen years of age, from the definition of ‘rape’.
The case would be heard by a three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud.
The petitions were triggered by decisions from Karnataka and Delhi High Courts, requiring an authoritative pronouncement from the top court.
The Karnataka High Court had held that a husband was liable to be charged for rape if he had forcible sex with his wife. The Karnataka government had supported the High Court judgment in an affidavit in the top court subsequently.
“A man is a man; an act is an act; rape is a rape, be it performed by a man the ‘husband’ on the woman ‘wife’,” the Karnataka High Court had observed in its decision, saying an accused should trial regardless of the immunity in the penal code.
A Division Bench of the Delhi High Court had however in May last year delivered a split verdict in a separate case on the identical issue. Justice Rajiv Shakdher, who headed the two-judge Bench, had struck down as unconstitutional the Exception two to Section 375 of the IPC.
However, Justice C. Hari Shankar, the associate judge on the high court Bench, had rejected the plea to criminalise marital rape, noting that any change in the law should be carried out by the legislature since the issue required consideration of various aspects, including social, cultural and legal.
Published – October 16, 2024 11:38 pm IST
