How a pink book paved the way to equal rights

NEW DELHI: “Many people deny that homosexuality exists in India, dismissing it as a phenomenon of the industrialised world. Others acknowledge its presence but condemn it as a capitalist aberration, a concern too individualistic to warrant attention in a poor country like ours. Still others label it a disease to be cured, an abnormality to be set right, a crime to be punished. The present report has been prepared with a view to showing how none of these views can stand the test of empirical reality or plain and simple common sense.”

This is how a small, 70-page booklet with a pink cover titled “Less than gay: A citizen’s report” on the status of homosexuality in India starts. Published in 1991 by a collective called the Aids Bhedbhav Virodhi Andolan (ABVA), the report was the first document of its kind that broke the silence around the lives of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT).

“What struck me about the Less than Gay report was its rigour and how it drew on historical and theoretical discourses. Less than Gay was the first such document on gay and lesbian lives in India,” said Jaya Sharma, an activist who knew Siddharth Gautam, a young advocate who co-founded ABVA, and worked extensively on the report with the group. A film festival in his memory was started in 1993.

One of the most powerful aspects of Less Than Gay was its detailing of LGBT stories from around India — from Mizoram in the Northeast to Siliguri in north Bengal to Virar in Mumbai. It spoke to a wide range of LGBT experiences, from violence, heartbreak, loneliness, to the thrill of discovering finding companionship.

“Less than Gay, which we call the Pink Book, broke the silence around homosexuality. It tempted you to come out,” said Maya Sharma, a 68-year-old Barodabased activist. The 1990s were a tumultuous time for the public expression of gender and sexuality in India. The ABVA filed a petition against Section 377 in 1994 in the Delhi high court but it lay in cold storage. Outside the courts, though, the world was changing.

In 1991, Delhi-based activist Giti Thadani started a network called Sakhi where lesbian women could communicate via letters. In the same year, Delhibased women’s group Jagori started a research project on single women (Ekal Aurat). Several of them would met informally in each other’s homes. “Some of us were not open to using English terminologies, preferring to use ‘sakhi’ which pertains to female friendship, and which allowed women to address their sexual identity while retaining privacy,” recalled Maya of her association with Jagori.

Pratibha Parmar, a Londonbased filmmaker of Indian origin was prolific at this time, making short films that dealt with women’s sexuality.