Can having an extramarital affair be considered abetment to suicide? Yes, according to Justices R Banumathi and Vineet Saran of the Supreme Court.
In a judgment that could have dangerous implications, the apex court has held that a Karnataka man abetted the suicide of his wife, on the sole basis that he had been having an “illicit relationship with another woman”.
This decision goes against several years’ worth of the Supreme Court’s own jurisprudence, where they’ve held that mere evidence of an extramarital affair isn’t enough to constitute abetment to suicide – there needs to be some specific act by the husband with the intent that this drives the wife to take her own life. Justice Banumathi’s judgment in the new case fails to even distinguish itself from the existing precedent.
This judgment is dangerous because it disregards the right to privacy (which includes the right to choose one’s own sexual partner), fails to ask the questions it needs to, and ignores the rule of law. Expanding the scope of what counts as abetment of suicide is problematic, and this isn’t even the first time these two judges have done this, with a previous judgment convicting a woman of abetment to suicide for calling the deceased a prostitute.
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