From William Shakespeare to Vikram Seth, literary works that find place in Section 377 judgement

In a historic judgement today, the Supreme Court struck down the 158 years old archaic law under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code and decriminalized consensual sex between adults, regardless of gender..This judgement is nothing short of a watershed moment for the Indian society as regards inclusivity with the fight for equal fundamental rights for the sexual minorities attaining finality..Unsurprisingly, for a case as historic as this, the judgement ran for nearly 500 pages with four out of the five Judges hearing the case penning down their opinions, albeit all concurring. Section 377 was struck down unanimously, so far as sex between consenting adults of same sex is concerned..Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, Justice Rohinton Nariman, Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice Indu Malhotra wrote separate judgements while Justice AM Khanwilkar concurred with CJI Misra’s opinion..While this judgement touches upon themes and subjects like Constitutionalism and Constitutional morality it sometimes also goes into some softer moments with the Honourable Judges breaking into poems and excerpts from literary works to beautifully drive the message home..From Shakespeare to Vikram Seth, there is an eclectic collection of literary works by writers, poets, playwrights, Judges, songwriters, and thinkers referenced to in this Judgement..Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra:.CJI Misra opens his Judgement with a quote by the German thinker, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe:.“I am what I am, so take me as I am”.Highlighting the concept of individualism, CJI Misra has quoted German Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer:.“No one can escape from their individuality”.Borrowing from John Stuart Mill on individualism:.“But society has now fairly got the better of individuality; and the danger which threatens human nature is not the excess, but the deficiency of personal impulses and preferences.”.The evergreen lines from William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet also find a place in CJI Misra’s judgement:.“What‘s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”.Speaking about Human Rights, CJI Misra quotes South African anti-apartheid activist, philanthropist, and political leader Nelson Mandela:.“To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity.”.And quotes Martin Luther King Jr. to emphasize on the need for justice for all:.“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”.English Barrister and Judge Sir Edward Coke’s thoughts are also relied upon to highlight that consensual sex in the privacy of one’s home is neither harmful nor causes disturbance:.“The house of everyone is to him as his castle and fortress, as well for his defence against injury and violence as for his repose.”.Justice Rohinton Fali Nariman:.Justice Nariman brings out the stigma that same-sex couples faced in Victorian England by quoting by Lord Alfred Douglas, the lover of Oscar Wilde, in his poem Two Loves:.“The love that dare not speak its name”.Justice Nariman refers to the Fundamental Rights as the “North Star” in the “universe of Constitutionalism”, in a reference to the play Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare:.“I could be well moved, if I were as you; If I could pray to move, prayers would move me: But I am constant as the Northern Star, Of whose true-fixed and resting quality There is no fellow in the firmament.”– Caesar tells Cassius (Act III, Scene 1).Justice DY Chandrachud:.On life, love and criminalisation of it, Justice Chandrachud quotes Justice Leila Seth, the first woman Chief Justice of the High Court from her article published in an English Daily in 2014,.“What makes life meaningful is love. The right that makes us human is the right to love. To criminalize the expression of that right is profoundly cruel and inhumane. To acquiesce in such criminalization, or worse, to recriminalize it, is to display the very opposite of compassion. To show exaggerated deference to a majoritarian Parliament when the matter is one of fundamental rights is to display judicial pusillanimity, for there is no doubt, that in the constitutional scheme, it is the judiciary that is the ultimate interpreter.”.Leonard Cohen’s song 1992 song “Democracy” finds a place in Justice Chandrachud’s judgement under the part “Ashes of the Gay”:.“Democracy It’s coming through a hole in the air, … It’s coming from the feelthat this ain’t exactly real, or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there. From the wars against disorder, from the sirens night and day,from the fires of the homeless, from the ashes of the gay: Democracy is coming”.Justice Chandrachud too, like CJI Misra, quoted Martin Luther King Jr. while speaking on the ideals of morality and justice:.“the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”.A reference is made by justice Chandrachud to the poem Through Love’s Great Power written by Indian novelist and poet Vikram Seth, a day after the Supreme Court refused to review its decision in the Koushal case:.“Through love’s great power to be made whole In mind and body, heart and soul – Through freedom to find joy, or be By dint of joy itself set free In love and in companionhood: This is the true and natural good. To undo justice, and to seek To quash the rights that guard the weak – To sneer at love, and wrench apart The bonds of body, mind and heart With specious reason and no rhyme: This is the true unnatural crime.”.Read the highlights of the judgment here.