The government of India, has pleaded with the country’s top court to be more lenient when dealing with cases of marital rape, Edum News reports.
It made this request during an ongoing case brought by campaigners seeking to outlaw it.
The penal code introduced in the 19th century during British colonial rule of India explicitly states that “sexual acts by a man with his own wife… is not rape”.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government enacted an overhauled code in July which retains that clause, despite the decade-long court challenge by activists seeking to make marital rape illegal.
However, India’s interior ministry filed an affidavit to the Supreme Court on Thursday stating that while marital rape should result in “penal consequences”, the legal system should treat it more leniently than rape committed outside of marriage.
“A husband certainly does not have any fundamental right to violate the consent of his wife.
“However, attracting the crime in the nature of ‘rape’ as recognised in India to the institution of marriage can be arguably considered to be excessively harsh,” the affidavit said, according to The Indian Express newspaper.
India’s current penal code mandates a minimum 10-year sentence for those convicted of rape.
The government’s statement said that marital rape was adequately addressed in existing laws, including a 2005 law protecting women from domestic violence.
Written by Hope James
