The Indian Army Doesn't Want Gay Officers to Go 'Unnoticed and Unpunished'

More than a year after the Supreme Court decriminalised gay sex and adultery in two separate judgements, prompting pride movements to spread their wings like never before, the Indian army feels it would be best to undo these decisions to ensure discipline in the forces. According to a report released by PTI, sources claim that the army has approached the Ministry of Defence over concerns that adultery and gay officers within the force are going “unnoticed and unpunished”. They believe that these acts need to stay punishable as they act as a deterrent against moral corruption and that it could create a command and control problem if they were to go unpunished.

At a press interaction on Wednesday, October 30, General Ashwani Kumar, the Adjutant General of the Indian Army, who is responsible for the welfare of the ranks and handles all their complaints, said that some cases may be "legally right but ethically wrong". When asked whether the Army wants to review the top court’s judgment, he replied saying, "How do you know that we haven't already done so?" While he has assured that the army will abide by the Supreme Court’s decision, he says that the army will try to use other provisions to make being gay and adultery stay punishable offences. They want to do this through Section 45 of the Army Act, a separate act made by the Parliament to deal with “unbecoming conduct” of officers and army troops. If this goes through, an officer, who faces charges of being gay, will not be tried under Section 46 of the Army Act which punishes officers for "any disgraceful conduct of a cruel, indecent or unnatural kind", but instead will be tried under section 45 for "behaving in a manner unbecoming of his position and character expected of him".

This attitude was earlier brought to the spotlight by Army Chief Bipin Rawat earlier this year when he said gay sex and adultery would both not be allowed in the Army. "It was something which was unheard of when the Army Act was made. We never thought this is going to happen. We never allow it. Therefore it was not put in the Army Act," General Rawat had said. Officials also feel that adultery is unacceptable since it’s all about “stealing affection of a brother’s wife”.

Even as the rest of the country marches forward to celebrate the LGBTQ community and normalise queer conversations, it’s disheartening to see those meant to protect us are adopting such regressive thinking to exclude an entire community, instead of shielding the country from such homophobic ideas.

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