Chandigarh: In a landmark judgement, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has held that prisoners in jail also have the right to have sex with their legal partners.
The court said that it is the fundamental right of jail inmates and convicts to be allowed to have conjugal visits or artificial insemination if they are married and want to have a child.
"A society which is currently involved in academic and intellectual debates on 'gay-rights' or the recognition of 'third-gender', cannot shy away nor can it keep concealed under the carpet the pragmatic concept of conjugal visits of the jail inmates. To say it differently, time has come and before it is too late, the stake-holders must sit together and deliberate upon this crucial subject and take a holistic view," Justice Surya Kant observed, as per reports.
Justice Kant made the observation while dismissing a plea by a couple,Jasvir Singh and Sonia, both of whom are lodged at the Patiala Central Jail.
The duo, who was sentenced to death for the kidnapping and murder of a teenager, had pleaded the court to allow them to resume their conjugal life for the sake of child birth.
While the court disallowed Jasvir and Sonia's plea over the heinous nature of their crime, it allowed jail inmates in general to have conjugal visits for progeny.
The court, however, did set certain conditions and authorised the state to regulate such visits by law.
