{"id":264971,"date":"2023-10-18T19:44:10","date_gmt":"2023-10-18T14:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/?p=264971"},"modified":"2023-10-18T19:44:10","modified_gmt":"2023-10-18T14:14:10","slug":"scs-marriage-equality-judgment-unpacked-two-views-on-four-key-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/scs-marriage-equality-judgment-unpacked-two-views-on-four-key-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"SC\u2019s marriage equality judgment unpacked: Two views on four key issues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><b>Source: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The post is based on the article \u201c<\/span><b>SC\u2019s marriage equality judgment unpacked: Two views on four key issues\u201d<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> published in <strong>\u201c<\/strong><\/span><b>Indian Express\u201d on 18th October 2023<\/b><\/p>\n<h2><b>What is the News?<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court has refused to grant legal status to same-sex marriages by <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">3-2 majority.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>What are the views of the judges on the four key questions related to same-sex marriages?<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-264972\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Screenshot-2023-10-18-at-3.29.19%E2%80%AFPM.png?resize=300%2C173&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"173\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Screenshot-2023-10-18-at-3.29.19%E2%80%AFPM.png?resize=300%2C173&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Screenshot-2023-10-18-at-3.29.19%E2%80%AFPM.png?w=736&amp;ssl=1 736w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong> Hindustan Times<\/p>\n<p><b>On Fundamental Right to Marry: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The petitioners argued that there exists a fundamental right to marry a person of one\u2019s own choice under the Constitution and that the court must address the denial of that right:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Minority View: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The marriage is not inherently a fundamental right as it has been shaped by state regulation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Majority View:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It agreed with the minority view.It said that personal importance doesn&#8217;t automatically make something a fundamental right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Interpretation of Special Marriage Act: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">SMA was enacted in 1954 to enable marriage between inter-faith or inter-caste couples without them giving up their religious identity or resorting to conversion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The petitioners had asked the SC to interpret the word marriage as between \u201cspouses\u201d instead of \u201cman and woman\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The petitioners had asked for striking down provisions of the SMA that are gender-restrictive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Minority View: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It opposes expansive interpretation of the Special Marriage Act, fearing it could infringe on legislative powers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Majority View:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">stated that the court could not interpret the SMA to include same-sex couples since the objective of the legislation is not to include same-sex couples within the realm of marriage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Queer couples\u2019 right to adopt a child: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The petitioners had argued that the guidelines of the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), which does not allow unmarried couples to jointly adopt children is discriminatory against queer couples who cannot legally marry.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CARA guidelines allow only a couple who have been in at least two years of a stable marital relationship to be eligible to adopt.Individually, queer persons can adopt as single people.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, a single male is not eligible to adopt a girl child\u00a0 even though a single female is eligible to adopt a child of any gender.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Minority View:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It strikes down certain CARA regulations emphasizing that preventing unmarried couples, including queer ones, from adopting isn&#8217;t in the child&#8217;s best interests.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Majority View:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It largely agrees with the discrimination against queer couples but suggests only the legislature can change the adoption criteria.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/sc-hearing-pleas-on-same-sex-couples-right-to-marry-what-is-civil-union-how-is-it-different-from-marriage\/\"><b>Civil unions<\/b><\/a><b> for queer couples: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The judges had discussed recognising civil unions for queer couples as a halfway approach during the hearing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In US, before full marriage rights were recognised for same-sex couples by the US Supreme Court, several states had allowed civil unions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Minority View: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It held that the right to form civil unions falls within the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2013 It also noted the Solicitor General\u2019s statement that a committee chaired by the Cabinet Secretary would be constituted to set out the rights which would be available to queer couples in civil unions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>\u2013 Majority View:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It disagreed with the view that the court can prescribe a \u201cchoice\u201d of civil unions to queer couples.It recommended that the state can facilitate this option if the community desires it.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source: The post is based on the article \u201cSC\u2019s marriage equality judgment unpacked: Two views on four key issues\u201d published in \u201cIndian Express\u201d on 18th October 2023 What is the News? A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court has refused to grant legal status to same-sex marriages by 3-2 majority. What are the views&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/scs-marriage-equality-judgment-unpacked-two-views-on-four-key-issues\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">SC\u2019s marriage equality judgment unpacked: Two views on four key issues<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10317,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1566,1731,1760,1],"tags":[11872,10500],"class_list":["post-264971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-factly-articles","category-bill-and-acts","category-polity-and-nation","category-uncategorized","tag-9pm-daily-factly","tag-indian-express","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":145,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1700117453},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264971","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\/10317"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}