The Court made the remark while dealing with a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by advocates Shubhi Srivastava, Ajay Kumar Singh, Prince Kumar, N Zubemo Lotha and Garima Singh, and a former civil servant Ashok Kumar Singh.
The plea said that BNS provisions related to rape, sexual assault, stalking and voyeurism, etc are unconstitutionally restricted to a man-perpetrator and woman-victim framework.
It was argued that Sections 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 73, 75, 77, 78 and 81 of the BNS apply only where the perpetrator is male and the victim female, leaving no legal recourse where the victim is a man, a transgender person, a third-gender person, or an animal, or where the perpetrator is a woman or a third-gender/transgender individual.
The petitioners contended that there should be a gender-neutral interpretation of these provisions or a writ of mandamus directing the Central government to amend the law.
It was also highlighted that Section 377 of the IPC – which criminalised non-consensual and non-adult acts – was dropped entirely from the BNS without a substitute provision, creating a “constitutional nightmare.”