Voluntary castration is not an offence, a Delhi court has said while acquitting two persons of the charges of castrating a man who had opted for emasculation for securing ‘badhai’ rights which are available only to transgenders.
It was “ironical and hypocritical” that in India while a male gets himself castrated with the sole purpose of achieving monetary gains by acquiring the ‘badhai’ rights, suggestion of giving castration as punishment to serial rapists evokes strong sentiments, Additional Sessions Judge Kamini Lau said.
The judge said: “... The mere mention of castration (chemical or surgical) as a form of punishment for serial rapist and paedophiles, evokes strong sentiments and kicks up an intellectual storm by terming it as Talibanic and barbaric, despite its legalisation in the so-called civil world.”
“The law as it stands, of now, is that emasculation/castration of a male by his own volition and consent is not an offence and it is only a forcible emasculation/ castration which is an offence,” the court said. In the custom of ‘badhai,’ transgenders or eunuchs sing, dance and confer blessings and the power to confer blessings on people on auspicious occasions like childbirth and marriage was given to them by Lord Rama, the court noted in its verdict.
