The Union Cabinet will soon have to tell the Supreme Court whether it supports the Delhi High Court's decision to decriminalise homosexuality. But Home Minister P Chidambaram says the question before the Cabinet is now essentially a constitutional matter. Despite the moral objections raised by religious leaders, among others, Chidamabaram says the Cabinet will have decide whether the law which is more than a century old violates constitutional rights.

Here's what the Home Minister told NDTV's Barkha Dutt in a exclusive interview:

NDTV: But as a liberal thinker and a lawyer, Mr Chidambaram, do you not believe that to criminalise the private lives of consenting adults is actually to interfere with their right to personal liberty?

Chidambaram: My personal view is irrelevant.

NDTV: What is your personal view?

Chidambaram: It's irrelevant. I'm here as Home Minister.

NDTV: What does the government have to factor? What does the Home Minister have to factor?

Chidambaram: I've just told you.

NDTV: What's the other side?

Chidambaram: Oh, there is another side. You read it in the papers...moral, religious, family, what happens to the institution of marriage. Therefore, I think debate has been widened into areas where the court has not ventured at all.

NDTV: Why is there so much political reticence on this?

Chidambaram: There is no reticence. There's a process.

NDTV: Do you think a secular states needs to factor in what the clergy of various religions is saying?

Chidambaram: The judgement of the court is not a pronouncement on morality. It's a pronouncement on legality.

NDTV: So you could oppose the Delhi High Court order in the Supreme Court.

Chidambaram: Well, well, there are many many personal opinions which will be expressed in the Cabinet. It's eventually what the Cabinet decides that becomes the govt's decision.

NDTV: You don't think it's an archaic law?

Chidambaram: It is an old law. It's a centuries' old law. That's not the point.

NDTV: That's the point. It hasn't changed with the times

Chidambaram: This is a constitutional issue now. Is criminalisational of this behaviour constitutional or not? The court has said it is unconstitutional and that's what the Cabinet has to consider.