New Delhi, Feb 2 (PTI) A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court will re-examine the two-year-old verdict by which a colonial law, criminalising consensual sexual acts between the same sex under section 377 of IPC, was restored.
The apex court said since important issues concerning the several “constitutional dimensions of importance” were ingrained in the challenge against Section 377 which criminalised homosexuality, “it would be appropriate to refer the issue to a five-judge Constitution bench.”
Section 377 of IPC, introduced by the British Raj way back in 1860, criminalises sexual activities between the same sex as it was “against the order of nature”.
A three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices A R Dave and J S Khehar agreed that the matter involving important issues concerning the scope of human relationship needed to be heard by a larger bench.
The bench said the larger bench would be constituted in the future.
It was told that there were eight curative petitions seeking re-examination of the order on the review petition and the December 11, 2013 judgement by which the Delhi High Court verdict de-criminalising section 377 (unnatural sexual offences) of the IPC was set aside.
A battery of senior lawyers appeared in the case today.
At the outset, senior counsel Kapil Sibal, arguing for decriminalising section 377 of IPC, submitted that major constitutional issues are involved in the matter.
He submitted that the issue concerned the “most private and the most precious” part of life, that is right to sexuality, which has been held as unconstitutional.
“Any provision that penalises an adult persons’ expression of consensual sexuality in private domain is significantly unconstitutional,” Sibal submitted.
“By this judgement, you have bound the present and future generations to dignity and stigma,” he submitted by referring to the December 11, 2013 verdict of the apex court restoring the provision of section 377 of the IPC which was decriminalised by the High Court.
Hearing his brief arguments, the bench said such an important issue needed to go to a Constitution Bench of five judges.
The bench was informed that the All India Churches Association and All India Muslim Personal Law Board were against decriminalising homosexuality, when the Chief Justice asked Sibal “whether there is anyone opposing you.”
The counsel for the Churches Association said their opposition was on a principled stand. “Homosexuality is an abomination in the Bible” and decriminalisation of Section 377 would lead to its legalisation, he said.
Prasanta Patnaik