Will the govt back gay rights?

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.