Today, October 17, the Apex Court of India delivered a verdict on granting legal recognition to same-sex marriages. The Supreme Court ordered against the community, which means same-sex marriage cannot be legal in India.
In Asia, only Taiwan and Nepal are the countries that recognize same-sex marriage. If the Supreme Court had announced the decisions in favor, then India would have become the third country to do so.
What is the Supreme Court Verdict on Same-Sex Marriage?
For several years, the government of India has constantly opposed the decision. The LGBTQIA+ community was hopeful that the five-judge bench headed by CJI Chandrachud would deliver the decision in their favor.
These requests have been met with opposition from the Indian government, which labels them as “urban elitist views” and says that the parliament is the appropriate forum for discussing the issue. Such unions are allegedly not “comparable with the Indian family unit concept of a husband, a wife, and children.”
The judgment has now been made public by the five bench judges, and it is not in favor of the community. By a vote of 3-2, the Supreme Court rejected the idea that same-sex marriages are constitutionally acceptable.
Furthermore, there is no basic or constitutional right to civil unions, no entitlement for queer couples to adopt jointly, and no authority for the Center’s proposed high-powered committee to look into the issues of same-sex couples.
Is Same-Sex Marriage Legal in India?
The judgment did not grant legal validity. The LGBTQIA+ community claims that their rights are violated by the lack of legal support for same-sex marriages and that they continue to endure discrimination in spite of the 2018 ruling.
On September 6, 2018, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was unanimously overturned by a five-judge court, decriminalizing same-sex relationships between consenting adults. The Chief Justice of India (CJI) at the moment, Justice DY Chandrachud, was one of the judges on the bench.
“Though in the end, the verdict was not in our favor, so many observations made were in our favor. The court also put the responsibility on the central government, and the government’s solicitor general said so many things against us, so it is important for us to go to our elected government, MPs, and MLAs and tell them we are as different as two people. The war is underway. It might take some time, but we will get societal equality,” said Harish Iyer, petitioner-activist.
Same-Sex Marriage FAQs
A. The LGBTQ couples can’t adopt a child in India. Only heterosexual couples are recognized as eligible for adoption under Indian adoption rules.
A. The abbreviation ‘LGBTIQA+’ is a dynamic term representing the following terms: intersex, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning, and asexual. There are also more labels that people use to express their experiences with their gender, sexuality, and physiological sex traits, like non-binary and pansexual.
A. Currently, Gay marriages are illegal in India.