Indian Army Chief Bipin Rawat on Thursday said that homosexuality will not be allowed in the Army.
During his annual press conference, when asked about the Supreme Court’s ruling which decriminalized homosexuality, Rawat said, “We will not allow this to happen in the Army. ” He added that the Indian army has its own laws on homosexuality.
“We are not above the country’s law but when you join the Indian Army, some of the rights and privileges you enjoy are not what we have. Some things are different for us,” he said.
A five-judge constitution bench of the Indian Supreme Court last September unanimously decriminalised a part of a colonial-era law under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which banned “consensual unnatural sex”, saying it violated the rights to equality.
When asked about the Supreme Court ruling on adultery, he said the Army is “very conservative”.
“We can’t allow it to perpetrate into the Army,” he said.
