[Same-Sex Marriage] Delhi High Court Directs Centre To "Positively" File Its Reply Within 2 Weeks In Plea For Live Streaming Of Proceedings

The Delhi High Court on Thursday directed the Central Government to "positively" file its reply within 2 weeks in an application seeking live streaming of proceedings in the case concerning recognition and registration of same-sex marriages in the country.The Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Navin Chawla ordered,"Reply has not been filed by the Centre. Let the same be filed positively within 2 weeks."The application was filed by three professionals based out of Mumbai and Karnataka, in the petition filed by Abhijit Iyer Mitra seeking registration of marriages of LGBTQIA couples under the Hindu Marriage Act.Notice in the application was issued in November 2021. It submitted that a substantial number of people (about 7-8% population of country) are interested in the proceedings and outcome of this matter. However, they are unable to witness the proceedings due to space constraint in Courtrooms and limitation of technical platforms like Cisco Webex, which is currently being used by the High Court for hybrid functioning.Senior Advocate Neeraj Kishan Kaul today submitted that it has already been 4 months since notice was issued and if the Centre doesn't respond on this plea then another adjournment will be sought. Senior Advocate Menaka Guruswamy pointed that the matter is being adjourned for last three occasions and argued that Constitutional rights of the LGBTQ community that were recognized in Navtej Singh Johar v. Union of India are at peril.Kaul further submitted that in the Swapnil Tripathi case, Centre has already submitted before the Supreme Court that all matters of national importance will be live-streamed. "This case is of seminal importance to a big section of the population," he said.Accordingly, the Court directed that reply to the application be filed in two weeks.Senior Advocate Saurabh Kirpal expressed concern about the time that may be required to arrange the infrastructure for Live Streaming and urged that the Centre be directed to take expeditious steps in that regard. However, the Court assured that sufficient infrastructure is in place.The matter will now be taken up on May 17.About the pleasThe petition filed by Abhijit Iyer Mitra seeks registration of marriages of LGBTQIA couples under the Hindu Marriage Act. It is argued that the language used in the Hindu Marriage Act is gender-neutral, and it doesn't explicitly prohibit the marriages of same sex couples.In another plea filed by Dr. Kavita Arora, a direction is sought to be issued to the Marriage Officer, South East Delhi, to solemnize her marriage with her partner under the Special Marriage Act. it is her case that the fundamental right to choose one's own partner for marriage under Article 21 of the Constitution extends to same-sex couples as well.The plea moved by Joydeep Sengupta, an OCI card holder, and his partner Russell Blaine Stephens prays for a declaration from the Court that "a spouse of foreign origin of an Indian Citizen or OCI cardholder is entitled to apply for registration as an OCI under the Citizenship Act regardless of the gender, sex or sexual orientation of the applicant spouse."The plea reasons that since S. 7A(1)(d) of the Citizenship Act, 1955, does not distinguish between heterosexual, same-sex or queer spouses, a person married to an Overseas Citizen of India, whose marriage is registered and subsisting for two years, should be declared eligible to apply as a spouse for an OCI card.The High Court has also issued notices on two related petitions, one seeking recognition of the marriage of a Transgender person and another seeking recognition of marriage of a lesbian couple.Read Centre's response to the pleas here.

[Same-Sex Marriage] Delhi High Court Directs Centre To "Positively" File Its Reply Within 2 Weeks In Plea For Live Streaming Of Proceedings

Akshita Saxena

Tags