India scrapping antiquated British-era laws and decrees

Nearly 70 years after independence, India has embarked on ridding its statutes of British-era laws and decrees from the 19th and early 20th centuries in a move to modernise its legal systems and procedures.

"The government is determined to relegate several archaic laws to history," said federal law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad earlier this week.

Laws, he said, needed to be consonant with the times, adding that 1,300 redundant Acts and statutes had been scrapped so far while another 1,824 awaited repeal.

The long overdue scrapping of obsolete Victorian and Edwardian decrees follows a promise by prime minister Narendra Modi during his 2014 election campaign. He said his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government would repeal 10 obsolete laws for every new one passed.

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Many of the laws being repealed have long-since passed their sell-by date.

The Indian Motor Vehicles Act (1914) for instance, requires all prospective candidates applying to become motor vehicle inspectors in southern Andhra Pradesh province to have well-brushed teeth. Pigeon chests, knock-knees, flatfeet and hammertoes all rendered applicants unsuitable for the job, according to the law.

The recently repealed Indian Aircraft Act (1934) was equally bizarre, demanding permits to fly kites, balloons and gliders similar to the ones required to operate an aeroplane.

Treasure Trove Act

The Treasure Trove Act of 1878 provides for the arrest a person finding in the soil anything worth more than 10 rupees (€0.14 ) and not reporting it to a designated revenue officer.

The 1874 Recruitment Act empowers the federal government to prevent Indians from being recruited by any foreign state or organisation, while another 100-year-old law decrees that the toll on boats ferrying passengers across the Ganges river not exceed two Annas, a currency denomination scrapped in 1957.

Other anachronistic laws include a jail sentence for any adult male refusing to combat a locust attack in Delhi and the 1885 India Post Office Act that permits police and intelligence organisations to monitor all mail. The colonial government employed this measure to keep an eye on suspected subversive activity, and until a few decades ago successive Indian governments also used this Act for broadly the same intrusive purpose as their colonial predecessors.

Criminalisation of gays

But one draconian law in the Indian penal code of 1860 that continues to agitate activists, political parties and legal experts 157 years later is the one criminalising gay sex, which is still punishable with up to 10 years’ imprisonment.

This Victorian-era law, scrapped in Britain in 1967, deems gay sex as “unnatural” and to the anger of Indian lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender activists, it was upheld by India’s supreme court in 2013.

In language reminiscent of colonial times the court endorsed section 377 of the Indian penal code prohibiting “carnal intercourse against the order of nature”, a legal euphemism for consensual gay sex.

In its 25-page judgment, the court decreed that courts should not intervene in this matter and that it was up to parliament to legislate on the issue of homosexuality. The issue of LGBT rights remains deadlocked in India’s traditionalist parliament.

"All governments are circumspect in what colonial-era laws they repeal, as keeping them dormant ensures that they can be strategically employed whenever required" said lawyer Amir Cowshish. It's a legal game all administrations play, he added.