Who decides morality?: Hundreds killed each year for marrying outside caste, says CJI Chandrachud

The CJI said that while the law regulates external relations, morality governs the inner life and motivation.

New Delhi, Dec 18: Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud on Saturday lamented that hundreds of people are killed each year for falling in love or marrying outside their castes or against the wishes of their families.

The chief justice was referring to an incident of honor killing in Uttar Pradesh in 1991 as carried in a news article by the American magazine, Time.

The CJI was delivering a lecture on "Law and Morality" in memory of eminent jurist and former Attorney General of India late Advocate Ashok Desai.

The CJI said that morality is a fluid concept and expressions of good and bad, right and wrong are often used in everyday conversations.

"The article stated that villagers accepted the crime. Their actions were acceptable and justified (for them) because they complied with the code of conduct of that society in which they lived. However, is this the code of conduct that would have been put forward by rational people? If this is not a code of conduct that would have been put forward by rational people? Many people are killed each year for falling in love, or marrying outside their caste or against their family's wishes," CJI Chandrachud was quoted saying by Bar and Bench.

Who decides morality?

He highlighted that morality is often dictated by dominant groups, while members of weaker and marginalised groups are forced to submit to dominant groups and cannot develop their counter culture because of oppression.

"Who decides the code of conduct or morality? The dominant groups, which overpower the weaker ones. The vulnerable groups are placed at the bottom of the social structure, that their consent even if attained, is a myth," he remarked.

The members belonging to the marginalized communities have little choice but to submit to the dominant culture for their own survival, the CJI opined.

"Vulnerable sections of society are unable to generate a counter culture because of humiliation and separation at the hands of the oppressor groups. The counter culture, if any, that the vulnerable groups develop, is overpowered by the government groups to further alienate them," the CJI said while referring to the 'negotiation of morality due to power difference.'