via BBC
A court in the Indian capital, Delhi, has ruled that homosexual intercourse between consenting adults is not a criminal act.
The ruling overturns a 148-year-old colonial law which describes a same-sex relationship as an "unnatural offence".
Homosexual acts were punishable by a 10-year prison sentence.
Many people in India regard same-sex relationships as illegitimate. Rights groups have long argued that the law contravened human rights.
Delhi's High Court ruled that the law outlawing homosexual acts was discriminatory and a "violation of fundamental rights".
The court said that a statute in Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which defines homosexual acts as "carnal intercourse against the order of nature" and made them illegal, was an "antithesis of the right to equality".
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2 comments:
According the CBC, this ruling applies to Delhi only, not the entire country. Perhaps decriminalisation for all of India is still a ways off...
Still good to celebrate this victory!
Whilst it is not entirely clear what the ruling means in terms of the law (apart from the judges findings), it was about whether Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code was unconstitutional or not, and the court found that it was, in terms of criminalising homosexual sex between consenting adults (18 years and older) in private, so it would apply to all of India. The case was taken in the Delhi high court, as the Naz Foundation (India) Trust, who filed the petition, is based there.
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