HOMOSEXUALITY

Section 377:

• Section 377 of Indian Penal Code (IPC) criminalizes "carnal intercourse against the order of nature". Carnal means relating to physical, especially sexual, needs and activities.
  
  
• It criminalized all forms of sexual activity other than heterosexual penile-vaginal intercourse which includes Child abuse, Beastality and Sex among Homosexuals.
  
  
• Person convicted under this section can be imprisoned for 10 years and even for life.
  
  
• Battle for its removal:
  • The section was decriminalized with respect to sex between consenting adults by the High Court of Delhi on July 2009.
    
    
  • That judgement was overturned by the Supreme Court of India on 11 December 2013 with the Court holding that amending or repealing Section 377 should be a matter left to Parliament, not the judiciary.
    
    
  
  
  

Recent Supreme Court Verdict:

• The SC Bench has unanimously held that criminalisation of private consensual sexual conduct between adults of the same sex under Section 377 of the IPC was unconstitutional.
  
  
• The court, however, held that the “unnatural” sexual acts like bestiality and sexual act without consent continues to be a crime under Section 377.
  
  
• Arguments given:
  • It declared the tyranny of Section 377 “irrational, indefensible and manifestly arbitrary.” Section 377 thus far punished homosexuality with 10 years of imprisonment.
    
    
  • It called the law “Macaulay’s legacy,” which continued for 68 years despite a liberal Constitution because of the manifest lethargy of the lawmakers.
    
    
  • It shackled the human instinct to love and has been a reason for much tragedy.
    
    
  • It violated the right of the LGBTQ community to “equal citizenship and equal protection of laws.”
    
    
  • Bodily autonomy was individualistic. Choice of a partner was part of the fundamental right to privacy.