SINGAPORE, July 14 — Singapore’s highest court is hearing challenges to a 76-year-old ban on gay sex, a divisive issue after India reversed a decision to strike down a similar law and same-sex marriage was allowed in New Zealand last year.

Lawyers for Kenneth Chee and Gary Lim argued that the ban, first adopted under British colonial rule in 1938, discriminates against gay men and violates rights to equal protection guaranteed by Singapore’s constitution. A two-day hearing before a three-judge panel began today.

Singapore lawmakers in 2007 agreed to keep the law, known as Section 377A, when they repealed related provisions that made heterosexual oral and anal sex a crime. Gay-rights activists and church groups advocated last year against and for the ban, which the government says it hasn’t actively enforced since the mid-1990s. That prompted the Attorney General’s Chamber to warn that comment on the case could be in contempt if calculated to affect the court’s decision.

“The majority of the population still favours the current legal framework,” Law Minister K. Shanmugam told Bloomberg News last month when asked about the case and its background. While society is evolving and social mores are changing, “the government has taken the position that this is a situation where it is best to agree to disagree.”

Police issued an advisory asking attendees at this year’s annual gay-pride rally Pink Dot on June 28 to “keep the peace” and avoid comments on race and religion. The warning followed Muslim and Christian groups calling on their followers to wear white on the day to signify “purity” and to oppose the event.

‘Moral future’

Gay activists early last year started an online petition for abolition ahead of a lower court hearing on the law’s constitutionality, and a group of pastors met Shanmugam to present their views on defending the nation’s “moral future.”

The Singapore Court of Appeal hearing today comes as battles over gay rights gained prominence in the past two years. India in December overturned a 2009 verdict legalizing consensual gay sex. Russia enacted anti-gay laws, stoking international ire, and New Zealand became the first Asia-Pacific nation to legalize gay marriages.

A US Supreme Court ruling triggered uncertainty in the country, where states have a patchwork of laws and court rulings allowing gay marriage in some and banning it in others.

Mandatory jail

Singapore Judges Andrew Phang, Belinda Ang and Woo Bih Li are hearing the arguments on behalf of Chee, 38, and Lim, 46, as well as a parallel appeal by another man, Tan Eng Hong, against the ban on acts of “gross indecency” between males. Offenders face mandatory jail terms of as long as two years.

Blogger Alex Au Wai Pang was accused in November of being in contempt by allegedly insinuating the courts planned to rig hearing dates on the challenge. There’s no maximum punishment for the offense in Singapore. Au’s case is pending.

The judiciary shouldn’t override parliament, the attorney general’s office told the High Court in February 2013 when Lim and Chee’s case was first heard. Section 377A’s purpose is to preserve public morality and signify society’s disapproval of gay conduct, government lawyers said.

High Court Judge Quentin Loh agreed, saying the courts should be slow in overturning parliament’s decision.

Judicial intervention

The views expressed during the 2007 parliament debate and in the case “are without a doubt controversial and disparate among various segments of our society,” according to Loh’s April 2013 ruling. “It is not one which, in my view, justifies heavy-handed judicial intervention ahead of democratic change.”

He had similarly dismissed Tan’s claim in October.

Chee and Lim, a couple for the past 17 years, are being advised by former UK Attorney General Peter Goldsmith. He helped with their written submissions after his bid to argue the case in court was rejected. Deborah Barker is their Singapore lawyer. Tan is represented by M. Ravi. Chief prosecutor Aedit Abdullah will argue the case for the Attorney-General’s chambers.

“The law treats them differently and labels them as criminals,” Barker told the court today. It should either be declared void or modified to exclude acts between consenting adults in private, she said.

There were a total of 185 people convicted under section 377A over a 10-year period from 1997 to 2006, according to figures from the Home Affairs Ministry. Seven people were convicted in 2006, with 1999 having the highest at 31.

Conservative society

In the early 1990s, undercover police arrested several men in sting operations, charging them with molestation and public solicitation, according to reports in The Straits Times. A magazine with advertisements targeting homosexuals had its publishing licence suspended and some theatre plays deemed as promoting homosexual lifestyles were censored.

Even so, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong told parliament in 2007 that “the government does not act as moral policemen.” Singapore is a conservative society with space for homosexuals, he said then. Lee said in January 2013 it was best for Singaporeans to “agree to disagree” on the issue of gay rights.

About 47 per cent of 4,000 Singaporeans in a survey commissioned by the government rejected “gay lifestyles,” according to the results released in August. Twenty six per cent were receptive and 27 per cent neutral.

Then-Chief Justice Yong Pung How wrote in a 1995 ruling that he was “confident that the judicious exercise of prosecutorial discretion will prevail” in applying Section 377A.

Public interest

In 2003, then-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong said homosexuals were allowed to work in the civil service. Singaporean media published stories at the time touting the so-called pink dollar of affluent gay tourists. The following year, police banned a planned year-end celebration by a gay events group for being “contrary to public interest.”

While authorities have allowed a separate gay-pride event, Pink Dot, to be held since 2009, three children’s titles were withdrawn from national libraries recently — including one based on a real-life story of two male penguins that hatched an egg at the New York Zoo — after complaints that they weren’t “pro-family.” Books in the adult section do contain titles with homosexual themes, the National Library Board said.

A record 26,000 pink-clad people turned up last month at Pink Dot, sponsored by companies including Google Inc. since 2010, Barclays Plc since 2012, and Goldman Sachs Group Inc, which became a sponsor this year.

‘Culture of meritocracy’

Edward Naylor of Goldman Sachs and John McGuinness of Barclays said their banks supported events like Pink Dot as part of their commitment to diversity and inclusive workplaces.

“Attracting, retaining and motivating people from diverse backgrounds, including people of all sexual orientations, is essential to our success,” Naylor said.

“Barclays is committed to a culture of meritocracy, where people are judged on professional performance rather than their personal lives,” McGuinness said.

Robin Moroney, a spokesman for Google, referred to the company’s comment in a May Pink Dot announcement that encouraging diversity “can lead to brilliant and inspiring ideas.”

The cases are Lim Meng Suang v Attorney-General, CA54/2013. Tan Eng Hong v Attorney-General, CA125/2013. Singapore Court of Appeal. — Bloomberg