Shashi Tharoor Condemns India's Failure to Criminalize Marital Rape Despite Democratic Values

Dec 12, 2025 01:36 pm CST

Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor criticized India's legal stance on marital rape, highlighting how the country remains among the few democracies that fail to properly criminalize non-consensual sexual acts within marriage. Speaking in Kolkata, Tharoor called the current legal exemption for husbands a "travesty of justice" based on outdated assumptions about marriage, advocating for comprehensive reform to protect women's rights and autonomy regardless of marital status.