Same-sex verdict compels queer couples to lead dishonest lives, review petition tells Supreme Court

A review petition has been filed in the Supreme Court against the majority judgment refusing to legalise same-sex marriage.

The Supreme Court judgment on same-sex marriage compels queer couples who wish the joys of a real family to remain in the closet and lead dishonest lives, a review petition said.

The petition seeks a review of the top court’s majority judgment refusing to legalise same-sex marriage. The judgment concludes queer partners suffer from the indignity of discrimination in their everyday lives, but then turns them away with best wishes for the future, Udit Sood, a petitioner, said.

On October 17, the Supreme Court said it did not want to leave the constraints of judicial power to encroach into the legislative domain of the Parliament. It said the Parliament was the ideal forum to debate and pass laws, or not, on the question of conferring legal status to same-sex marriage.

A majority of the three judges on the Constitution Bench disagreed with the view of Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud that the government should at least grant a ‘civil union’ status to same-sex partners, saying such a concept was not backed by statutory law.

The review petition contended the majority judgment contradicted itself in several fronts.

For one, the Constitution Bench had said the Parliament conferred social status for marriage as an institution under the Special Marriage Act of 1954. But, despite this finding, the Bench had finally settled on the opposite premise that the terms of marriage were largely set independent of the state, and the status of marriage was not conferred by the state.

The petitioners had urged the Constitution Bench to include same-sex marriage within the ambit of the 1954 Act.