THE FUTURE OF ARTICLE, 377 Happy and Gay?
The United States of America recently legalized gay marriages in the states which earlier had rules against them. This not only came as a relief to all the gay couples residing in these states, but, it also called for celebrations all around the world.
India was one of the countries that also took part in the celebrations even though article 377 of the Indian Constitution renders same sex marriage as illegal. The article 377 penalizes any ‘unnatural’ carnal intercourse. It is now in major argument from everyone in the country about why is our government making decision on one’s sexual preferences?
As a growing country, we have achieved quite a lot of things, that we could not have imagined achieving a few years back. But, we still have not broken the shackles of thinking and broadened our horizons when it comes to sensitive issues like these. The LGBT community is a long forgotten cause today.
The utmost urgency is that the state formally and legally recognizes this community which has been sidelined for so long. The ruling made by the Supreme Court in 2013 saw wide scale protests and many people openly came out to support the cause. All these voices, however, did not find their way into the administration and the ruling was not taken back.
Places all over the country have organized gay pride parade and people in large numbers joined hands to show their solidarity for this cause. The LGBT community are the not the only ones who have been disappointed, but also various other sections of the public feel the same way.
The ruling made by the US Supreme court, however, will have a huge impact on the Indian Government as well. People have already started having hopes that India will follow USA’s lead and legalize gay marriages in India too.
The main reason that people have a problem with homosexuals is that they cannot reproduce. Everything boils down to one point-Reproduction. For us Indians, more about two men loving each other or two women loving each other, the main problem is these lovers not being able to conceive a baby. Being in a society that puts procreation as its highest ideal, it doesn’t quantify or identify any relationship that does not adhere to this ideal. And instead of learning to identify them, we shun them and push them to back realms of our society. Any formidable occurrence of the same leads to oppression.
It is believed that the historic ruling made by USA will impact such attitudes all around the world and might lead to a political movement to change the laws in countries that still criminalize gay marriages. As gay couples in USA rush to get married, Indians are also hoping that Modi Ji’s ‘Acche Din’ see the coming of treating everyone as equals and giving them a right to choose their own partners.
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