Govt must ensure that LGBT persons have equal rights
In September 2018, the Supreme Court read down Section 377 so far as it pertained to consensual sexual relations between same-sex adults. The verdict was rightly hailed as a watershed moment for the country’s LGBT+ community. It came four years after another landmark SC judgment—the NALSA verdict that gave the right for persons to self-identify their gender and affirmed that they were equal citizens under the Constitution.
Yet, two recent instances have brought to light the yawning gap between the rights assured in courts and accessed in day-to-day life. First, a gay couple moved the Kerala HC seeking the Special Marriage Act be ruled unconstitutional as it implicitly restricted marriage to between a man and a woman. Second, a man and transwoman, married close to two years ago, in Coimbatore have been struggling to have their marriage registered. This is despite a Madras HC ruling in April 2019, which drew from the NALSA verdict to state that trans persons have the right to marry. The court had ordered that the marriage of the petitioners be registered.
The LGBT community has long fought for marriage rights and several nations guarantee the right to marry or have civil unions. Even critics of marriage as a patriarchal heteronormative institution that is inherently oppressive would be hard pressed to deny that, given the way society and states function, there are real benefits to marriage. Marriage provides for social recognition of a relationship, it ensures rights to inheritance, to hold joint bank accounts, make a partner a nominee for pension, insurance and other benefits. Given cisgender heterosexual couples are free to marry and access these privileges, denial of similar privileges to LGBT persons is a denial of their access to equal rights under the Constitution. But the matter cannot be left to the courts alone; each couple cannot turn to the judiciary for assistance. It is time the government stepped in, consulted with experts and the community, and amended laws that prevent LGBT persons from exercising their rights as equal citizens.