At present, if a man files a complaint against a woman for committing offenses like rape, sexual harassment, stalking, voyeurism or outraging the modesty, she goes scot-free as the 158-year-old archaic Indian Penal Code (IPC) believes only men can commit such a crime.

In this time we are thinking about the protection of women from sexual violence and we have enacted a number of laws for them. What about the protection of male and boys? How can we protect their dignity and respect from the attack of sexual assault? Our Indian penal code defines that rape can only be done by MAN and in this case the women can only be victim. We have done amendment in Section 375 in Criminal Amendment Act, 1983 after the famous case Tukaram V. Union Of India [i] and in the Criminal Law Amendment Act 2013, on the recommendation of Justice Verma Committee Report. In this amendment Sexual Intercourse defined because of the petition in the case of Sakshi Vs Union of India[ii]. Now the sexual intercourse is not just penile-vaginal intercourse but its scope is increased and it covers many other acts in the definition of Sexual Intercourse.

The present section 375 is A man is said to commit “rape” if he-
Penetrates his penis, to any extent, into the vagina, mouth, urethra or anus of a woman or makes her to do so with him or any other person; or
Inserts, to any extent, any object or a part of the body, not being the penis, into the vagina, the urethra or anus of a woman or makes her to do so with him or any other person; or
Manipulates any part of the body of a woman so as to cause penetration into the vagina, urethra, anus or any of body of such woman or makes her to do so with him or any other person; or
Applies his mouth to the vagina, anus, and urethra of a woman or makes her to do so with him or any other person, [iii]

It is not only penetration of penis which amount to rape but inserting anything and applying mouth also constitute RAPE. These acts can be done by woman with any man or women without his or her free consent which must be criminalized but it is not recognized as rape because of this draconian law. More recently, the Delhi –based center of civil society found that approximately 18% of Indian adult men surveyed reported being coerced or forced to have sex. Of those 16% claimed a female perpetrator and 2% claimed a male perpetrator. [iv]

Present Judicial Trends
Many PIL have been filled in the Indian Court. Advocate Rishi Malhotra has recently filled a PIL in the Supreme Court and last year Mr. SANJIV KUMAR also filled a P.I.L. [v] in Delhi High Court for making section 375 genders neutral but these P.I.L. were rejected by the court because it is not the matter of judiciary but it is the matter of legislature to make amendment in I.P.C. "It is up to the Parliament. If they feel that this issue requires urgent attention, they must do it. We cannot direct the Parliament to collect data of such offenses and amend the IPC. We cannot amend the IPC," a bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra and also comprising justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud said. [vi] The law commission report 172nd and Justice Verma Committee Report are advocated to make gender natural rape laws. The Criminal Law Amendment Ordinance 2013 made the offence of rape gender neutral. However, due to the pressure from certain vested groups, a step in the right direction was held back and gender specificity was retained in the Amendment Act 2013.The Criminal Amendment ordinance,2013 based on Justice Verma Committee Report proposed SEXUAL ASSAULT instead of RAPE which was completely gender neutral which was: ‘375.

A person is said to commit sexual assault if that person-
(a) Penetrates his penis, to any extent, into the vagina, mouth urethra or anus of another person or makes the person to do so with him or any other person; or
(b) inserts, to any extent, any object or a part of the body, not being the penis, into the vagina, the urethra or anus of another person or makes the person to do so with him or any other person; or
(c) manipulates any part of the body of another person so as to cause penetration into the vagina, urethra, anus or any part of body of such person or makes the person to do so with him or any other person; or
(d) Applies his mouth to the penis, vagina, anus, urethra of another person or makes such person to do so with him or any other person;
(e) Touches the vagina, penis, anus or breast of the person or makes the person touch the vagina, penis, anus or breast of that person or any other person.

These cases of rape of male or rape by women is under reported and there is no database or statics regarding this because we have defined the gender of perpetrator and the gender of victim.
The recent criminal law amendment, 2018 discriminates between boys and girls such as that if the victim is girl then the culprit get harsher punishment than if the victim is boy. We should have such law where if a woman is culprit, she should be punished.

End-Notes
[i] 1979 SCR (1) 810.
[ii] AIR 2004 SC 3566.
[iii] Saumya Singh Chauhan, Section 375: Analysis of Provisions Relating to Rape, Academike (Apr. 29,2019,12:51A.M.),https://www.lawctopus.com/academike/section-375-analysis-of-provisions-relating-to-rape/.
[iv] Indian Law should recognize that men can be raped too, Centre for civil society (Apr. 29, 2019, 12:55 A.M.) https://ccs.in/indias-law-should-recognize-men-can-be-raped-too.
[v] Writ Petition (Civil) No. 8745 OF 2017.
[vi] Harish V Nair, Parliament can make law on rape gender –neutral, says Supreme Court, India Today (Apr. 29, 2019, 12:55 A.M.) https://www.indiatoday.in/mail-today/story/parliament-can-make-law-on-rape-gender-neutral-says-supreme-court-1160829-2018-02-03