After being together for over eight years, two female wanted legal recognition of their “committed relationship”
India: After being together for over eight years, Kavita Arora and Ankita Khanna wanted legal recognition of their “committed relationship”, just like any other couple would. But for them it meant thinking through various dimensions of where they live, their finances, interactions with friends and families, and their professional lives.
The two pinned their hopes on the judiciary as they felt assured about their relationship after the Supreme Court in 2018 struck down a colonial-era law that allowed police to prosecute LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) members as criminals.
Arora and Khanna moved the Delhi High Court last week with a plea to allow registration of marriages of same-sex couples under the Special Marriage Act and Foreign Marriage Act.
A two-judge bench led by Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw issued notice to the Centre, advising it to shed its age-old inhibitions when a government counsel said that such a situation has not arisen in the 5,000 years of Sanatan Dharma.
Arora is a psychiatrist and Khanna is a psychologist and arts-based therapist. Both are part of a child & adolescent mental health service in Delhi-NCR.
