IN INDIA, IS THE LAW ON MARITAL RAPE A PREJUDICE TO MEN?

“Law strives to regulate an individual’s standard of behavior by enacting numerous laws, yet assessing the standard of consent appears to be unreasonable.” The Indian Penal Code defines rape as “non-consensual sexual intercourse with a woman.” However, if the woman is over the age of 18, it exempts the husband from any criminal punishment if he forced intercourse on her without her agreement. When it comes to marital rape, the general consensus is that it is an unavoidable occurrence for married women. However, in today’s culture, where men assume that marriage gives them license to have sexual contact with their spouse despite the other party’s denial, a rule against marital rape is unquestionably vital but only if it is written in such a way that it is not exploited by women for personal advantage. Many laws have been passed in the country for the benefit of specific marginalized groups of the population. MARITAL RAPE LAW – A NECESSITY OR NOT Yes, a law against marital rape is required, but it is also likely to prejudice innocent males. As is generally known, women who are aware of the law seek it’s benefits , but not women who are victims of this offence. Marital rape isn’t really a necessity to the point that enacting a law on marital rape will result in the filing of fictitious marital rape cases. The concern arises as to how we can overlook the most important aspects due to some unfavorable elements. This question can be answered by the basic principle of Criminal Justice System “Thousand culprits can escape but one innocent should not be punished”. POTENTIAL ABUSE There is an expectation of sex in a marital relationship, which is why it would be quite easy for a wife who is angry with her husband to file a false rape case against him. A typical antecedent of law is the possibility of misuse. When law is passed for the benefit of a group of marginalized persons in society, there is always a group of people from the non-marginalized population on the receiving end who are subjected to bogus cases from time to time. By this logic, it appears that rape shouldn’t also be recognized as crime then, and that any crimes perpetrated against Schedule Castes and Schedule Tribes should not be punished. However, this does not indicate that we should dismiss the offence entirely; rather, we should try to find another solution. RECOGNISING MARITAL RAPE AS AN OFFENCE IN INDIA The problem isn’t with whether or not marital rape is considered a crime in India; it’s with how the criminal justice system works. “The law of marital rape should only be recognized in India if the flaws with the criminal justice system are successfully addressed.” The article’s main focus is on “We Bring the Change” and then recognizing marital rape as a crime. ISSUES ACTING AS A BARRIER IN RECOGNITION OF MARIAL RAPE AS A LAW There are three concerns and issues in the criminal justice system of India which requires change. The first issue is bail: as things stand now, the moment a person, particularly a man, is accused of marital rape before a police officer , the police will immediately arrest him, which is a problem as every relationship between two people – whether it is between a man and a woman, friends, or parents and a child – should have some friction because that is what human relationships are all about. The second issue is that when a criminal case is initiated, the police have total discretion to do anything they want, and neither the complainant nor the accused have any right to object. The investigator is the boss; he has the right to dismiss the entire case of the complainant and dismiss the entire case of the accused person if he so desires; hence, entrusting all the unmitigated power to a single person or institution may lead to abuse. This behavior may lead to wastage of so many months and years and is a kind of mental harassment as massive curbs shall occur in their way to success like they’ll not be getting any government jobs, work related to passport , may also put bar of freedom of liberty to move around etc. for a person who has been frivolously charged for such offence. The third issue with the criminal justice system is that it is difficult to recognize marital rape as a punished offence. “The evidence act states that if a woman alleges that she was raped by a man and it is proven that the woman and man did indeed have sexual intercourse, the accused person’s presumption of innocence until proven guilty is revoked, and it is the man’s responsibility to prove that the sexual intercourse was indeed consensual.” The practical problem with this, in layman’s terms, is that if the wife testifies that he forced sexual intercourse upon me after it was recognised as a punishable offence, the husband cannot deny that sexual intercourse did indeed took place. How can one establish that sexual intercourse was actually consensual , and if he is unable to do so, he will be charged with marital rape and sentenced to ten years in prison. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS The main problem with recognizing marital rape is that it runs the risk of trivializing the crime to the point where it is currently. Due to the premise that a marriage is a partnership between two persons, the ban on marital rape appears to be insufficient. Sexual intercourse is a very personal subject for the two people involved in a marital relationship. No one wants a stranger meddling in their personal affairs, which includes, of course, sexual relations. Determining whether sexual intercourse took place with consent or not appears to be very abrupt, based on the well-established notion of Indian culture, which is also a governing aspect for human behavior.