Navtej Singh Johar & Ors. v. Union of India
Background
A group of petitioners, including dancer Navtej Singh Johar, challenged the constitutionality of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalised "carnal intercourse against the order of nature" and had historically been used to criminalise consensual homosexual acts between adults. The Supreme Court had earlier, in Suresh Kumar Koushal v. Naz Foundation (2014), reversed a Delhi High Court ruling that had decriminalised consensual gay sex, reasoning that the LGBT community was only a "minuscule fraction" of the population. This fresh batch of writ petitions asked a five-judge Constitution Bench to revisit that question in light of the Court's intervening recognition of the fundamental right to privacy in the Puttaswamy judgment.
Decision Breakdown
All five judges, writing in four separate but unanimous opinions, held that Section 377 IPC, insofar as it criminalised consensual sexual conduct between adults (including same-sex couples) in private, was unconstitutional and violated Articles 14 (equality), 15 (non-discrimination), 19(1)(a) (freedom of expression), and 21 (right to life, dignity, and privacy) of the Constitution. The Court reasoned that sexual orientation is a natural and biological attribute of identity deserving constitutional protection, that criminalising private consensual conduct between adults serves no legitimate state interest and inflicts disproportionate harm and stigma on a minority, and that constitutional morality, not majoritarian social morality, must guide the interpretation of fundamental rights. The 2014 Suresh Koushal judgment was expressly overruled. The Court "read down" Section 377 to decriminalise only consensual adult conduct, while expressly preserving the provision's application to non-consensual acts, acts against minors, and bestiality, and clarified that the ruling would not reopen already-concluded prosecutions.
Lesson Learnt
Fundamental rights under the Constitution protect every individual, including small or socially marginalised minorities, regardless of majority opinion or "social morality," and a law criminalising purely private, consensual conduct between adults cannot survive if it offends dignity, privacy, and equality.