SC seeks response of Centre on pleas seeking criminalisation of marital rape

The Supreme Court on Monday sought a response of the Centre on a batch of petitions pertaining to criminalisation of marital rapeA bench comprising Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices PS Narasimha and JB Pardiwala asked the Union government to file its response on the issue by February 15 and the final hearing on the pleas would commence from March 21One of pleas has been filed in relation to the Delhi High Courts split verdict on the issueThis appeal has been filed by Khushboo Saifi one of the petitioners before the Delhi High CourtThe Delhi High Court on May 11 last year had delivered a split verdict on the issueHowever both the judges Justice Rajiv Shakdher and Justice C Hari Shankar on the bench concurred with each other for granting a certificate of leave to appeal to the Supreme Court in the matter as it involves substantial questions of law which requires a decision from the top courtWhile Justice Shakdher who headed the division bench favoured striking down the marital rape exception for being unconstitutional and said it would be tragic if a married womans call for justice is not heard even after 162 years since the enactment of the IPC Justice Shankar said the exception under the rape law is not unconstitutional and was based on an intelligible differentiaAlso Read Supreme Court stays Haldwani eviction says thousands cannot be uprooted overnightAnother plea has been filed by a man against the Karnataka High Court verdict which had paved way for his prosecution for allegedly raping his wifeThe Karnataka High Court had on March 23 last year had said exempting a husband from allegation of rape and unnatural sex with his wife runs against Article 14 equality before law of the ConstitutionFew other pleas have also been filed in the apex court on the issueSome petitioners have challenged the constitutionality of the marital rape exception under Section 375 IPC rape on grounds that it discriminated against married women who are sexually assaulted by their husbandsUnder the exception given in Section 375 of the IPC sexual intercourse or sexual acts by a man with his wife the wife not being minor is not rapeThis 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