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The Union government informed the Delhi High Court earlier this week that it was having a relook at its position spelt out over five years ago.

Laws for Marital Rape

• In India, marital rape is not defined in any statute or law.
• The exception in Section 375 of IPC says sexual intercourse by a man with his wife aged 15 years or above is not rape even if it is without her consent.
• In October 2017, the Supreme Court increased it to 18 years.
• Offence under Section 498A of the IPC, which deals with cruelty to a married woman by her husband or his relatives.
• The domestic violence act enables complaints against physical and sexual abuse.

Way Forward:

• There cannot be an ambivalent position towards buying time in this context. One cannot expect the courts to delay indefinitely a ruling on the constitutionality of the existing exception in rape law.
• It is time the Union government took a categorical stand on the issue of treating marital rape as a criminal offence.
• Justice J.S. Verma committee noted while recommending its removal, to an outdated notion of marriage that treated the wife as the husband’s property. The notion of ‘implied consent’ within marriage is also reflected in marriage laws that allow for “restitution of conjugal rights”, a remedy that either party to a marriage may avail of.
• Looking at marriage through the anachronistic lens of ‘coverture’ — the view that the wife is under the husband’s authority always — should not be allowed to override the autonomy of married women over their person.