The high courts and the Supreme Court of India have historically refused to exercise their constitutional authority to intervene in family law. The verdict of the Supreme Court in the case, Supriyo Chakraborty v Union of India, delivered on 17 October 2023, where it rejected the petitioner’s case for legal recognition of same-sex marriage, is consistent with that history. The courts have, in the past, repeatedly declined to scrutinise sex- and religion-based distinctions within personal law by the argument that these laws derived their authority from religion rather than the state and, hence, were outside the scope of judicial scrutiny. Even a basic account of the evolution of personal laws in India does not bear out such a claim. Every aspect of the personal law system bears the imprimatur of the state