This development comes a day after Attorney General KK Venugopal hinted that the government supported Section 377 and was opposed to scrapping it down.
“I had appeared for the curative (petition). I'm told the government's stand is different. Therefore, I'm not appearing in that case at all. I can't appear because the government of India has a different stand," he told reporters.
On Tuesday, a five-judge constitution bench headed by CJI Dipak Misra started revisiting its own 2012 verdict that criminalised homosexuality.
Entire LGBTQ community is now hopeful that this "archaic" and “colonial” legal provision will be done away with. The Delhi HC had ruled that Section 377 which prohibits “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal”, was unconstitutional.
AG Venugopal is not the first to not defend Section 377. Two former AGs - Mukul Rohatgi and Goolam Vahanvati - had also taken the same stand. In 2012, Vahanvati had famously said his “conscience would not permit him to do so”. He then independently assisted the court as an amicus.
This development comes a day after Attorney General KK Venugopal hinted that the government supported Section 377 and was opposed to scrapping it down.
“I had appeared for the curative (petition). I'm told the government's stand is different. Therefore, I'm not appearing in that case at all. I can't appear because the government of India has a different stand," he told reporters.
On Tuesday, a five-judge constitution bench headed by CJI Dipak Misra started revisiting its own 2012 verdict that criminalised homosexuality.
Entire LGBTQ community is now hopeful that this "archaic" and “colonial” legal provision will be done away with. The Delhi HC had ruled that Section 377 which prohibits “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal”, was unconstitutional.
AG Venugopal is not the first to not defend Section 377. Two former AGs - Mukul Rohatgi and Goolam Vahanvati - had also taken the same stand. In 2012, Vahanvati had famously said his “conscience would not permit him to do so”. He then independently assisted the court as an amicus.