AHMEDABAD: The Gujarat high court on Tuesday issued notice to the Centre and the state government over a much contentious issue of marital rape.
This was in response to a PIL that has challenged the legal provisions and demanded that sexual offences committed by a man against the wife should be made a punishable offence.
Saying that the PIL has raised an important issue, the bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Niral Mehta informed the petitioner’s advocate that it intends to pass an order on how the court proposes to deal with this subject.
The judges also reminded the government about its order passed in 2018 wherein it called for a need to criminalize marital rape and asked the government about the steps undertaken in that regard.
One Jaideep Verma from Vadodara has demanded that marital rape should be made a punishable offence, which is at present not a punishable offence by virtue of Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code, which also provides an exception that if a man commits rape on his wife, who is above 15 years of age, is not punishable.
The petitioner has challenged the constitutional validity of the exception given in the definition of rape in section 375 of IPC which gives immunity to the man from punishment provided under section 376 of IPC.
