- Of late, the raging issue of marital rape is in the news in India as several well-intentioned intellectuals, activists, intelligentsia, profound thinkers, elders, and most importantly, aggrieved victims are coming out in the open to question the same. The debate is succeeding in pushing several victims of marital rape to come out in the open to question the anachronistic law in vogue even as the modern-day world evolves in an unprecedented manner. The erstwhile muffled voices silently swallowing the shameful perpetration of marital abuses are finding resonation as more such cases reach the higher judiciary seeking relief from the inhuman treatment meted out by spouses.
PC: Nazrin Bano
- One such incident was recently reported in Karnataka. As part of a growing, just, and constitutional pushback against the marital rape exception, a single judge bench of the Karnataka high court has refused to quash the rape charges framed against a husband. Most importantly, it has laid out in clear and biting terms how the statutory immunity for rape committed by a man on his wife, is categorically out of place in India. Make no mistake, the time is indeed ripe now for quashing the existing law governing the issue without much ado. Relating to the issue, exception 2 to Section 375 of IPC, like most of the penal code, is a colonial intervention rather than some immutable native tradition as some votaries profess.
- Specifically, it emerged out of the ponderous English doctrine of coverture, relating to the husband’s ownership of his wife. Leaving aside, note that in the UK itself marital rape has long been criminalized even as India’s Constitution treats women equal to men and considers marriage as an association of equals, as pointed out by the high court. Something has to give in and it appears finally the powers-that-be are realising the same too. Remember, we are in the 21st century where progression on every front occurs dynamically. The technology-driven modern world should be equally complimented by the statutory laws upholding the virtues of gender equality and parity rather than taking recourse to outdated and biased treatment.
PC: istockphoto
- Note that the court has left it to the legislature to delve into the issue and rightly so since tabling the laws is the prerogative of the elected representatives. Ideally, the court’s ringing words should indeed impel Parliament to do so with urgency. The court noted that A man is a man, an act is an act, rape is a rape, be it performed by a man the ‘husband’ on the woman ‘wife’. But the HC’s own action suggests that courts need not wait for others’ precedents or even Parliament to do the right thing. Uphold equality as enshrined in Article 14, hear the voices of silence, and thereupon strike down the marital rape exception as unconstitutional. Let us not wait for an eternity to do away with the unsustainable exception.
