Radha Shara talks about LGBT Rights and Section 377 IPC.
Equality is a character of each and every democratic country it is found in their constitution as well it is the base of the foundation of law and society. But what does equality mean? Does it mean that each and every person will be treated equally in all situations or does it mean a group of people will be treated as equals only in certain situation?The term equality is described very well in the constitution of different countries. A country or society is made up of different class and different group of people so here we can say a country or society exits only till the people are present in that country, one of the group of the society is LGBT group (Lesbian are those female members who are interested or involved in sexual activities with another female member, Gay are those male members who are interested or involved in sexual activities with another male member , Bisexual are those persons who are sexually interested in both male and female and Transgender are those persons who can’t be neither in female group nor in male group) the group which can’t be ignored. The existence of this group can be traced from 15thcentury; many of the great writers like Aristotle, Athenaeus, Diodorus etc have mentioned different sexual activities between male members in different occasion in their books and study. The transgender can be traced from the time of Muslim empire they were appointed as maids in the chamber of queens. Even after their presence can be traced from such long a time but still they are not given equal rights. In 17th century homosexuality was not an offence in private but same was punishable in public place as it was deemed that it was against the conduct of normal nature created by god but later on the condition only worsen.
What do we mean by equal Rights LGBT? It means by same sex marriage, adoption, voting rights, educational, employment rights to transgender or any other type of partnership between the same sex partners in which they get voluntary involved. There are many countries which have given equal rights to LGBT group like Canada, France, Brazil, Iceland, Ireland, South Africa etc which allows same sex marriage but still there are many countries which do not allow same sex marriages for e.g India, Pakistan, Iran etc the main reason behind not allowing the same is because they deem that it is against the law of nature according to the nature only a men and women can enter into any sexual act. The sexual act only includes those acts which are done to reproduce for same sodomy is a crime in all the counties which do not allow same sex marriages. Another reason for denial of the rights is because all the countries have really rich religious values which won’t be breached under any condition, they feel allowing homosexuality will create immorality in the society.
Whereas the current situation in India speaks out loud that out of LGBT group only transgender are recognized and given some rights. In 2014 Supreme Court of India gave the transgender the status of third gender against female and male and directed the Central and State Government to consider transgender under OBC while providing for employment and education. The Indian Vedas show the presence of lord Shiva as half male and half female and Arjuna in Mahabharata was also shown to have lived as a transgender for a year in his exile so the transgender can be traced in India through the holy books this could be a reason transgender are being given the following rights like right to education, right to employment in both public and private sector, right to property and right to be issued public documents such as Aadhar Card, Passport, Ration card etc.
Whereas the homosexuals are being given almost no rights, the topic of homosexuality was firstly raised in the case of Naz foundation Vs. State of Delhi in this case a PIL was filed in Delhi High Court by a NGO to decriminalise same sex marriage and hold Section 377 of IPC unconstitutional the High Court gave the decision in favour of the Naz foundation and legalized same sex marriages but the decision was ruled over by Supreme Court and the Section 377 of IPC was held constitutional. The Section 377 of IPC provides that no man, women and animal should be involved in voluntarily carnal intercourse against the order of nature shall be punished by law with imprisonment which may extend to 10 years or fine or both. This codification clearly shows the status of Homosexuals in India.
The LGBT group should be given equal rights to choose their partner because they are also human being and have a right to choose what is good for themselves, it will increase the confidence of the coming generation, it will reduce the amount of divorce if people can come out about their sexuality and preference of their life partner and we might just spread equality all around
