Ministries wrangle over the law against homosexuality
The Delhi High Court is debating IPC Section 377 which is used in India to criminalize homosexuality among other things such as paedophilia. The law, which was introduced to India by the British, is against any form of carnal intercourse or sodomy and includes oral or anal sex between heterosexuals. Arguably, the law has very rarely been used against homosexuals, but that is not grounds to ignore it. Criminalizing and thereby denying human rights to a significant minority of the population for loving people of the same gender is certainly not democratic.
Some organizations working against AIDS and for homosexuals petitioned the HC which asked the Central government for a response. The Home Ministry headed by Shivraj Patil has argued against relaxing the law stating that homosexuality is a perversion, that homosexuals will corrupt the entire society and that it is unacceptable to Indian morals. How two consenting adults having sex will corrupt society, or how love happens to be a perversion just because the two individuals happen to be of the same sex is puzzling. And speaking of Indian morals, the law is a western import, not homosexuality. Homosexuality has existed in India for millennia as evidenced by murals in the temples. Here are two pictures: one from Khajuraho depicting oral sex between two men, known as auparashtika in Sanskrit, and described extensively in Vatsyayana’s Kamasutra; and the other is what appears to be anal sex between two men on a temple wall (unsure which temple).
The Congress is not alone to be blamed because a BJP member was in the HC recently arguing that homosexuality should remain illegal because it causes disease. But the court has been extremely patient and prudent in its hearings and asked the BJP member to provide any studies that prove his claim. Similarly, it has also refuted the Home Ministry’s claims that in countries where homosexuality is legal there has been an increase in crime or any problems with the law and order situation.
On the other hand, the Health Ministry headed by Dr Anbumani Ramadoss is an ardent supporter of decriminalizing homosexuality in order to prevent HIV and AIDS among one of the risk groups. He also expressed this intent at an international AIDS conference in Mexico City this year amid loud cheers. The National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) is also against Section 377 for this same reason.
What needs to change in India is not only the law, but also the social perceptions of homosexuals and transsexuals. But that is another story and the law certainly needs to be re-interpreted in the light of India’s democratic values and it’s historic tolerance. Let’s see what the court decides and hope that the Govt. is not prudish enough to take the matter to the Supreme Court if the judgement is not in the Home Ministry’s favour.
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