• Conjugal rights are rights created by marriage, i.e. right of the husband or the wife to the society of the other spouse.
• The law recognises these rights— both in personal laws dealing with marriage, divorce etc, and in criminal law requiring payment of maintenance and alimony to a spouse.
• Section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act recognises one aspect of conjugal rights — the right to consortium and protects it by allowing a spouse to move court to enforce the right.
• The concept of restitution of conjugal rights is codified in Hindu personal law now, but has colonial origins and has genesis in ecclesiastical law. 

Why has the law being challenged?

• The law is being challenged now on the main grounds that it violative of the fundamental right to privacy.
• The plea by two law students argues that a court-mandated restitution of conjugal rights amounted to a “coercive act” on the part of the state, which violates one’s sexual and decisional autonomy, and right to privacy and dignity.
• In 2019, a nine-judge Bench of the Supreme Court recognised the right to privacy as a fundamental right.