CJI defends his minority judgement in same-sex marriage case

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud has defended his minority verdict on some aspects pertaining to samesex marriages and said he stood by it as the judicial opinions are sometimes a vote of conscience and a vote of the ConstitutionOn October 17 a fivejudge Constitution bench headed by the CJI unanimously refused to accord legal recognition to samesex marriage saying there was no unqualified right to marriageHowever the CJI and Justice SK Kaul were in the minority on the issues of the right to form civil unions and the right to adoption of queer couplesSpeaking candidly at the 3rd Comparative Constitutional Law discussion cohosted by the Georgetown University Law Center Washington and the Society for Democratic Rights SDR New Delhi about him being in the minority in the samesex marriage judgements the CJI said I do believe it judgement is sometimes a vote of conscience and a vote of the Constitution and I stand by what I said He said the CJIs have been in the minority on rare occasionsBut there are 13 significant cases in our history where the Chief Justice has been in a minority And I do believe sometimes it is a vote of conscience and a vote of the Constitution and I stand by what I said he saidTherefore we said that well its time for Parliament to act Apart from that thats where I got into a minority I said though we cannot therefore entrench into the domain of Parliament Nonetheless there were sufficient foundation principles in our Constitution to allow for recognition of samesex unions in terms of civil unions he elaboratedThree of my colleagues another colleague joined me in this but three of my colleagues felt that to recognise a right of forming unions was again beyond the judicial domain and that it must be left to Parliament the CJI saidOn the fundamental issue as to whether samesex couples should have the right to form binding unions and cohabit traditional relationships three of my colleagues though they recognised that they do have the right he said We cannot elevate this to a constitutional rightThe other area in which I was in a minority was whether samesex couples have the right to adopt I said that well samesex couples and queer couples have the right to adopt a child because under Indian law a single individual can adopt a child and a woman can adopt a child So I said if they are together there is no reason to deny them the right to adopt the child merely because they are in a queer relationship he saidSo on the broader aspect there was a unanimity but on the right to form unions and adoptions I was in a minority of two as against three of my colleagues the CJI saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever