MUMBAI: The Indian government has insisted that `marital rape’ should be treated more leniently than other rape offences in an ongoing court case brought by campaigners seeking to outlaw it.

The penal code introduced in the 19th century 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.

India’s interior ministry submitted 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,” the affidavit said, according to The Indian Express newspaper. “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.”

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2024