Introduction  There is a separate category of offences; offences against body, few of which such as rape, unnatural offences etc. involve sexual conduct. Incest is also such an offence, though not recognised and punished in Indian criminal law as such, which means sexual intercourse between people who are usually legally prohibited from marrying because of their close or blood relationship, for example between brother and sister, father and daughter, mother and son, cousins, etc. It is the crime of sexual intercourse or cohabitation between a man and a woman who are related to each other within the degrees wherein marriage is prohibited by law.1  The term ‘incest’ finds its origin in Latin term incestus, which means ‘sexual impurity’.2  The gravity of this heinous wrong seems to be most dreadful among all such wrongs involving sexual conduct. It is an offence aga ....