IPC 377 rarely invoked in Tamil Nadu

Sexual minorities in Chennai also didtheir bit to make the most of Delhi HC ruling by dancing to fast numbers.

Transgenders in the city celebrate the Delhi High Court verdict decriminalising consensual gay sex among adults, on Wednesday.

CHENNAI: Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which prescribes life term for “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal”, has seldom been invoked in Tamil Nadu to book homosexuals or even harass transgenders over the years, according to senior police officers.

The law that has now been read down, thanks to a verdict by the Delhi High Court on Thursday, was once invoked to book a tourist from Poland who had sexually abused a schol student in Chennai.

DGP R Natraj, the then City Commissioner of Police, recalled the incident and said the section was used to book him because it was a case of sexual exploitation.

Natraj said that when he received complaints of trans­genders creating problems on the Marina, he did not invoke section 377. Instead, he ordered the rescue and rehabilitation of the transgenders with the help of an NGO.

Similarly, Additional Director General of Police, (Law and Order) K Radhakrishnan said that the section was never invoked during his tenure as CoP. But when he was DIG in Tiruchy, he had invoked the section to punish a priest, who sexually abused a school student.

According to section 377 (unnatural offence), “... whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with (imprisonment of life) or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to 10 years, and shall also be liable to fine.”

“Though gay, transgender and lesbian relationship can be termed as carnal intercourse, the police rarely receive complaints as they were mostly consensual,” A G Mou­rya, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Mylapore, said. While he was working as DSP in Ennore, he invoked the section against a man for having sex with a goat, he said.

Even former DGP Walter Dawaram, who was called the ‘supercop’ during his tenure, said that he have never invoked section 377 against anyone.

Interestingly, the State Crime Record Bureau does not have a separate category for section 377 to record the cases booked against transgenders. “We have records of crime only under common categories, like murder, rape and other things. We have no separate column for section 377, as we maintain the data based on the inputs we receive from the local police stations,’’ said a senior officer in Crime Record Bureau.