HC to examine if exception for marital rape violates wife’s right to sexual autonomy

HC to examine if exception for marital rape violates wife’s right to sexual autonomy

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Ahmedabad: 16.12.2021

The constitutionality of categorising marital rape as an exception to a law that criminalises sexual assault needs to be re-examined by a court in terms of whether this is “manifestly arbitrary and makes a woman’s fundamental right to sexual autonomy subject to the whims of her husband”, the Gujarat HC has said. Hearing a petition demanding that marital rape be made a punishable offence, which it currently isn’t under Section 375 of the IPC, the bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Niral Mehta on Tuesday issued notices to Centre and the state government. In its notices, it referred to a 2018 order that said sexual assault by a husband on his wife amounts to outrage of modesty under Section 354, irrespective of whether this was with or without the woman’s consent, or in absence of a third party. Stating that the PIL moved by Vadodara resident Jaideep Verma had raised an important issue, the bench informed the petitioner’s counsel that it intends to pass an order on how the court proposes to deal with the contentious subject of exception 2 to Section 375.

This exception provides immunity to a husband who from punishment under Section 376 for sexual assault on his wife as long as she is above 15 years of age.