The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday recommended the union government to amend section 377 (carnal intercourse against the order of nature) of the Indian Penal Code to include necrophilia as a punishable offence. The recommendation came after a division bench of the court headed by Justice B Veerappa along with Justice Venkatesh Naik T acquitted a man of rape charges who is accused of sexually assaulting a deceased 21-year-old woman.
The HC stated that “rape on a dead body” should either be punishable under the ambit of section 377 of IPC or a separate provision must be made to punish the offenders. The court also quoted the example of countries like England, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa, where necrophilia is treated as a punishable offence.
The observations of the court were made while hearing an eight-year-old case from Tumakuru, where a man Rangaraju, alias Vajpayi, allegedly murdered a 21-year-old woman in June 2015 by slitting her throat when she was returning from her computer classes. The accused had reportedly raped the body of the victim after murdering her. He was earlier sentenced to life imprisonment with a fine of Rs 50,000 for murder and ten years in jail with a fine of Rs 25,000 for rape by the Tumakuru district and sessions court. Rangaraju had appealed against the verdict, stating that there was neither an eyewitness nor any grounds for convicting him under section 376, which deals with rape.
The high court stated that while section 377 of IPC speaks about unnatural intercourse, it does not include the term “dead bodies”, and hence, the rape charges against Rangaraju were quashed. However, the HC upheld his murder conviction. The court further ruled that while the Act cannot be held as rape or unnatural sex under sections 375, 376, and 377, it can definitely be termed necrophilia or sadism and recommended the central government to frame laws against the same.
The court also observed the incidents of rape of deceased people in hospital mortuaries and recommended installing CCTV cameras in government and private mortuaries within six months to prevent such offences and uphold the dignity of the deceased. It also recommended maintaining cleanliness in mortuaries to preserve the bodies in a dignified manner. Maintaining the confidentiality of the deceased and raising awareness amongst mortuary staff were other recommendations that the court made.
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