LGBTQ+ IN INDIA

Introduction:
While India, as a country, has come a long way in terms of how we function as a society,
there still lie certain aspects that we’re way behind from where we are supposed to be i.e. our
perception towards the LGBT community. Indians consider it to be unnatural for a man to
love another man and a woman to love another woman Eventhough the Indian
Government has announced to have no qualms over it, that ideology has not yet
transpired in the minds of  people in India.
To understand this more we should deep dive in the history of LGBTQ+ community in India.
History:
LGBTQ+ Community Becomes a taboo for Indians:
In 1861, homosexuality was declared ‘against the order of nature’ by laws imposed by
Britishers and modelled the Buggery Act of 1533. However, this law did not act in
accordance with the attitude of Indians towards homosexuality at the time, but instead the
colonisers’ own strict Christian beliefs without taking into consideration the Indian’s
traditional cultural perceptions of same-sex attraction.
The First Indian Pride March was hosted :
On July 2nd 1999, India’s First Pride Movement was hosted : The Kolkata Rainbow Pride
Walk (KRPW), called The Friendship Walk, was the first Pride parade to be arranged in
South Asia. It was held to make a solid political statement and tolerance between the
LGBTQ+ community and other communities. 15 individuals took part in this march.
The KRPW has been organised since 2003 and has since grown in the amount of participants
with the 2018 KRPW having 5,000+ participants .
The Transgender Persons Act:

December 5th, 2019, The Transgender Persons Act, 2019 was passed with the aim of
protection of the rights of transgender people and it's welfare. This act was vehemently
rejected by the community if transgender's because of several clauses that were detrimental to
their fundamental rights, including reversal of the decision to approve them to change their
gender without being screened leaving intersex and gender-queer persons, and being
culturally insensitive towards the Hijra community.Despite of this the act was still passed
causing protests and outrage by the Indian LGBTQ+ community.

India’s First Gay Prince:

The Gay Prince, Mavendra Singh Gohil was born at Ajmer on 23rd of September 1965, as
the son of Maharana Shri Raghubir Singhji Rajendrasinghji Sahib, who continued the legacy
of the title of Maharana of Rajpipla in 1963.

Several years after his divorce in 1992, he got involved in a social network which helped
gays in the state of Gujarat. He says "It was difficult to be gay in my family. The villagers
worshipped us and we are their role models. My family didn't permit me the right to mix
with ordinary or low-caste people. Our exposure to a free world was quite minimal. Only
After I was hospitalized after my nervous breakdown in 2002, my doctor revealed the fact to
my parents about my sexuality. For Many years I was hiding my sexuality from my parents,
family and people. I never liked it, neither did I want to face the reality. Only When I came
out in the open and gave an interview to a friendly journalist, my life had been transformed.
Now, people accept me."

Bollywood And LGBTQ+ :

Bollywood has either invisibilized or hyper-sexualised LGBT characters. On silver screen the
stereotype of the flamboyant gay man was persistent and primarily used as an accessory.
Representation of female desire even among hetero couples has been rare, portrayal of female desire
in a same sex loves story, for the silver screen, was unthinkable.
However, there has always been a few rare movies, which shook up the largely conservative audience
and showed on silver screen the portrayal of queer characters, queer desire and quietly left its mark on
the audience. Few films like My brother Nikhil, Fire, Kapoor & sons ,Shubh mangal Jyada Savdhan
etc got the LGBT representation right. Which is definitely a welcoming change in Indian cinema.
Refrences:

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