'Invasion Of Privacy': MP High Court Rejects Husband's Plea For Wife's Virginity Test

The Madhya Pradesh High Court has recently dismissed a husband's petition seeking a virginity or two-finger test on the wife because she refused to enter into a physical relationship with him.The bench of Justice Vivek Jain observed that a virginity test could not be ordered as it violates the privacy of an individual and that the husband could produce other evidence to show that the wife was uninterested in establishing physical relationship. "this Court does not find any substance in the plea made by the petitioner/husband to subject the respondent/wife to medical examination as the said examination would be nothing but a virginity test which would be an invasion of privacy of the individual and is not relevant for the purpose of divorce as refusal to enter into sexual intercourse in itself is not a ground of divorce and the petitioner can adduce other evidence to prove disinclination of the wife to enter into sexual relations, as alleged in the divorce petition and virginity test or “two-finger test” of the wife would neither be relevant nor be conclusive for the purposes of the divorce petition. It would be nothing but invasion of privacy". The husband had challenged the order of the Family Court dismissing his divorce application on the grounds of cruelty. He contended that since the wife refused to enter into a physical relationship with constitutes cruelty. The wife, however, denied all allegations and argued that she was being harassed on account of dowry demand, subjected to physical and mental cruelty and to acts of sodomy by the husband.In the said application before the Family Court, the husband asked for a medical examination to ascertain whether she had ever entered into a sexual relationship with anybody and whether she had been subjected to sodomy/anal intercourse at any point in time. However, this application was dismissed. The counsel for the husband contended that the right to privacy cannot be claimed by any party during a matrimonial dispute, and therefore, the Family Court erred in rejecting the application. The bench noted that the parties entering or not entering into a sexual relationship is not grounds for divorce and is only relevant for purposes of cruelty allegations. Otherwise the said contention is neither ground for declaring the marriage as void nor voidable under Sections 11 and 12 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, nor a ground of divorce under Section 13. The bench further observed that, "the wife refusing sexual relationship in itself is not a ground of divorce nor it is a ground to declare the marriage as void or voidable". Regarding allegations of sodomy, the court noted that if sodomy was committed much before the medical examination, it would not lead to conclusive results and would merely be an invasion of privacy. The bench favoured the recent judicial trend of rejecting virginity test noting, "even otherwise it is medically well settled that even after sexual intercourse hymen may remain intact in some rare cases, and on other hand, hymen may be damaged even without sexual intercourse upon any other physical activity and, therefore, presence or absence of hymen, would not be a determinative factor to infer that whether there has been sexual intercourse with the respondent ever or not". Therefore, the bench rejected the husband's petition. Case Title: BK v PK [M.P. No.109 of 2026]Click here to read/download the Order

'Invasion Of Privacy': MP High Court Rejects Husband's Plea For Wife's Virginity Test

Jayanti Pahwa

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