In An Adulterous Relationship?

The Supreme Court decriminalized adultery but it’s still a ground for divorce

- Vandana Shah

The Supreme Court, in a landmark judgment, struck down the 158-year-old Section 497 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalizes adultery, as unconstitutional. On September 27, 2018, a five-judge Constitution Bench, led by (then) Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, in four separate but concurring opinions, held that adultery is not a crime and struck it off the Indian Penal Code. The Chief Justice remarked that the section violated a woman’s right to dignity and was violative of the Article 21 of the Constitution.

Essentially what the ‘adultery law’ did, was reduce the woman to merely being the property of a man who has no rights of her own in the context of adultery in a marriage. As Justice Chandrachud opined, “Section 497 denuded the woman from making choices. The law in adultery is a codified rule of patriarchy.”

Section 497 in the indian penal code