"Will steer clear of personal laws while dealing with same-sex marriage issue": Supreme Court

• The Indian Supreme Court is currently deliberating on the issue of legalizing same-sex marriage
• The court has decided to steer clear of personal laws of communities and focus on interpreting the Special Marriage Act
• The court will determine if the words "man" and "woman" in the Act can be read as gender-neutral by interpreting the word "persons"

The Supreme Court on Tuesday narrowed the scope of its deliberations on the issue of legalizing same-sex marriage, saying it would not consider questions that interfere with the personal laws of communities such as Hindus, Parsis, Muslims, Jews or Buddhists when deciding whether marriages are sexually established. can be legalized.

A bench of 5 judges clarified that they will stick to either interpreting or reading into word “persons” into the Special Marriage Act which deals with the words “man” or “woman” and if they can be read as gender neutral.

Chief Justice DY Chandrachud remarked, “Now that we’ve understood broadly the canvas of the matter, we can at this stage, steer clear of personal law. If we steer clear of personal law, perhaps that is one possible option of dealing with the case”.

Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul added, “we’re saying we’re not going into the broader canvas. We’re unwilling to go into personal laws. Therefore, they have agreed for the time being to argue on aspects which we’re considering”.