‘Unmarried partners, queer relationships to be considered as family’: Supreme Court

In the midst of the taboo surrounding domestic partners who reside together, the Supreme Court made a progressive observation during a hearing. The apex court said that domestic or unmarried partnerships, and even queer relationships, constitute a family.

"Familial relationships may take the shape of domestic, unmarried partnerships or queer relationships", the Supreme Court has observed, while noting that an ''atypical" manifestation of a relatives is as real as its traditional counterpart and deserves protection under the law, as per PTI reports.

During the hearing, a bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and AS Bopanna said that the understanding of the word “family” both within the law and in society is that ''it consists of one, unchanging unit with a mother and a father (who remain constant over time) and their children.

The apex court bench further said, “This assumption ignores both, the numerous circumstances which can cause a change in one's familial structure, and therefore the undeniable fact that many families don't conform to the current expectation, to start with. Familial relationships may take the shape of domestic, unmarried partnerships or queer relationships.”

This landmark hearing comes after several issues are raised within the recent past about LGBT couples residing together, and therefore the push for gay and queer marriages. After the decriminalization of homosexuality in 2018, many have also been urging for the correct to adopt for live-in couples.

The bench said that a household could also be a single-parent household for any number of reasons, including the death of a spouse, separation, or divorce. "Similarly, the guardians and caretakers (who traditionally occupy the roles of the "mother" and therefore the "father") of kids may change with remarriage, adoption, or fostering,'' it said.

The bench said that these manifestations of affection and families might not be typical but they're as real as their traditional counterparts and such atypical manifestations of the clan are equally deserving not only of protection under the law but also of the advantages available under financial aid legislation.