{"id":113673,"date":"2021-06-21T10:51:02","date_gmt":"2021-06-21T05:21:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=113673"},"modified":"2021-06-21T10:51:02","modified_gmt":"2021-06-21T05:21:02","slug":"marriage-rights-of-the-lgbtqia-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/marriage-rights-of-the-lgbtqia-community\/","title":{"rendered":"Marriage Rights of the LGBTQIA+ community"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Synopsis<\/strong>: India needs to look beyond the traditional concept of marriages to recognise marriages irrespective of gender identity and sexual orientation. Thus, India can recognise the marriage rights of the LGBTQIA+ community.<\/p>\n<h5><strong>Background<\/strong>:<\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>Recently, a case related <strong>to the <a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/lgbt-community-rights\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">question of same-sex marriages<\/a><\/strong> came up before the High Court of Delhi.<\/li>\n<li>But the Union Government requested the court to adjourn it on the ground that it is not urgent during the second wave of COVID-19 cases.<\/li>\n<li>Court and the government ignored the suffering of the community without the legal protection of marital relationships.<\/li>\n<li>In India, marriages are observed under <strong>personal laws. <\/strong>Such as the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, Indian Christian Marriage Act, 1872, Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act, 1937.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>However, Same-sex and queer marriages are not legally recognised in India.<\/p>\n<table style=\"width: 100%; border-collapse: collapse; background-color: #f0e4e4;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 803px;\">Read More: <a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/madras-high-court-guidelines-for-mainstreaming-lgbtiqa-community\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Madras High Court guidelines for mainstreaming LGBTIQA+ community<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<h5><strong>How marriage rights of the LGBTQIA+ community evolved globally?<\/strong><\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>South Africa: <\/strong>In 2005 South African court held that the common law definition of marriage i.e. \u201ca union of one man with one woman\u201d is inconsistent.\n<ul>\n<li>As a result of the verdict, the Civil Union Act, 2006 was enacted which enabled the voluntary union of two persons above 18 years of age.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Australia, the reforms by Honourable Michael Kirby in 2007: <\/strong>the Federal Government enacted the Same-Sex Relationships Act 2008 to provide equal entitlements for same-sex couples in matters of social security, employment and taxation.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 of England<\/strong>: It enabled same-sex couples to marry in civil ceremonies or with religious rites.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Obergefell vs Hodges case, USA<\/strong>: In 2015, the Supreme Court decided that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<table style=\"width: 100%; border-collapse: collapse; background-color: #f2e1e1;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 100%;\">Read more: <a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/need-to-ban-the-conversion-therapy-of-the-lgbtqia-community\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Need to ban the Conversion therapy of the LGBTQIA+ community<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<h5><strong>Judgements in India recognising marriage rights of the LGBTQIA+ community:<\/strong><\/h5>\n<p>In India also, there is judicial guidance available to recognize same sex marriages.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Arunkumarand Sreeja vs The Inspector General of Registration and Ors, 2019<\/strong>: The High Court of Madras interpretated the term \u2018bride\u2019 under the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 and expanded its scope.\n<ul>\n<li>It says a \u2018bride\u2019 includes transwomen and intersex persons identifying as women.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, a marriage between a male and a transwoman can be valid under the Act.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Shafin Jahan vs Asokan K.M. and Others AIR 2018 (Hadiya case):<\/strong> The Court upheld that the right to choose and marry a partner comes under right to freedom.\n<ul>\n<li>Court also observed that marriage lie within a core zone of privacy and society has no role to play in determining our choice of partners.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It shows that <strong>bar to same-sex and queer marriages are violative of Articles 14, 15 and 21<\/strong> of the Constitution of India. Further, the concept of marriage that it is a bond between \u201ca biological man and a biological woman\u201d <strong>can not be defended.<\/strong><\/p>\n<h5><strong>Way forward:<\/strong><\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>The marriage laws must be expanded to include all gender and sexual identities.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Reform in the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955<\/strong> is needed to bring self-respect marriages under its domain.\n<ul>\n<li>Self-respect Marriages were legalised in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry through amendments to the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.\n<ul>\n<li>Self-respect marriages have done away with priests and religious symbols such as fire or saptapadi. Instead, the solemnisation of self-respect marriages only requires an exchange of rings or garlands or tying of the mangalsutra.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>It will help in breaking caste-based and gender-based practices.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The recognition of the unequal laws discriminating against the LGBTQIA+ community and rectifying them is the need of the hour to make the world more inclusive and equal.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/epaper.thehindu.com\/Home\/ShareArticle?OrgId=GKM8MA63D.1&amp;imageview=0\">The Hindu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Synopsis: India needs to look beyond the traditional concept of marriages to recognise marriages irrespective of gender identity and sexual orientation. Thus, India can recognise the marriage rights of the LGBTQIA+ community. Background: Recently, a case related to the question of same-sex marriages came up before the High Court of Delhi. But the Union Government&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/marriage-rights-of-the-lgbtqia-community\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Marriage Rights of the LGBTQIA+ community<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[8095,1399],"class_list":["post-113673","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-lgbtqia-community","tag-soc_7","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113673","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113673"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113673\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}