Under the reinstated law, gay sex and any other sex seen as ‘unnatural’ is now punishable with life imprisonment.
The Hindustan Times reports:
Naz Foundation – an NGO fighting for gay rights – on Monday filed a curative petition in the Supreme Court requesting it to “correct” its verdict criminalising gay sex.
A curative petition is the last option available to a litigant after exhausting all the appeals and dismissal of review petition. Curative petitions are generally not heard in open courts.
Maintaining that the SC verdict required “immediate reconsideration”, the petitioner contended that the SC judgment contained many “patent errors on the face of the record”, including non-consideration of its main contentions regarding violation of fundamental rights and mistake of law.
“We hope the Supreme Court would entertain our curative petition and grant us open court hearing enabling us to advance oral arguments,” senior advocate Anand Grover, who has been representing Naz Foundation in this case, told HT.
The SC had on December 11 reversed a landmark 2009 Delhi high court verdict decriminalising gay sex. It had revived section 377 of the Indian Penal Code that makes gay sex an offence punishable with life imprisonment. On January 28, it declined to review its verdict re-criminalising consensual gay sex in private.
A bench of Justice HL Dattu and Justice SJ Mukopadhaya had dismissed eight review petitions filed by gay rights organizations and activists and the Union of India during in-chamber proceedings. Under SC rules, advocates cannot argue review petitions unless ordered by the court.
Amid public outrage, the Centre had moved SC with a plea to review its verdict, calling it a grave miscarriage of justice to thousands of LGBT persons.
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