to a small inner circle. For the moment the generated wide public awareness on how NAPM seeks to mobilise, is to create a cultural NAPM is concentrating on expanding its illusory the dam's benefits are in the long climate in which the destructive, self- circle of involvement and considering how run. This means imaginatively articulating defeating nature of the high consumption to intervene in the forthcoming a vision of a different , which even the mode! becomes self-evident. elections. It is clear that NAPM and its stressed out city dweller who commutes to However, this ambitious task is probably constituents arc not contenders for power. work every day in sub-human conditions, well in the future. For the moment the It is a different matter that some who share can relate to. NAPM's biggest challenge is internal. The the NAPM umbrella may on their own choose A political platform that voices the larger societal challenges can be addressed to participate in putting up, or supporting, concerns of the most disadvantaged to the only if the loose amalgam of activist candidates. But NAPM's interest lies in exclusion of other stratas of society is likely groups can first succeed in forging an finding ways to place its agenda of concerns to have a limited scope. But if NAPM is to effective unity that strengthens people's at the centre-stage of the political mainstream. go beyond these limits it must contend with struggles for control over their natural How effectively it will be able to do this the reality of people's rising aspirations - resource base. depends on how cohesive an organisational with the cyclist who would own a scooter, [This was written for Charkha, a multilingual structure it is able to create. This is partly and the scootcrist who aspires to own a car, feature service for activists and others concerned dependent on how many experienced full- etc. The challenge before the fraternity, which with development and social justice issues.] time workers are available to NAPM and what momentum those in leadership roles can generate. At present theco-ordinators of NAPM are Gay Rights in India Banwarilal Sharma of Azadi Bachao Andolan. Thomas Kochery of National Vimal Balasubrahmanyan Fishworkers Forum and Medha Patkar of Narmada Bachao Andolan. Among those Even within 'progressive' circles there appears to be ignorance and who are also taking an active role are veteran prejudice on the subject of . None of the civil liberties socialist leader Kishen Patnaik, Abdul Jabbar of Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog, groups liave so far listed gay rights as an item on their agenda, Chittararyanof theChilika Bachao Andolan, although individual activists may be sympathetic. The task on hand and G Narayana who comes from the today is to bring about the repeal of of the Indian Penal Sarvodaya tradition. The process of building Code which makes homosexuality a criminal offence. an effective team is going to place extraordinary demands on all involved, both in terms of establishing an acceptable chain THREE years ago on August 11, 1992 the inmate had died of AIDS. A resolution was of command and a collective perspective. AIDS Bhedbhav Virodhi AndoIan(ABVA) passed which, among other things, highlights By moving from their immediate issue- had demonstrated in against harassment the following points: based or geographical spheres, to an and arrest of suspected homosexuals under - The culture, heritage and even religion endeavour like NAPM these activists arc Sections 72-73 of the Delhi Police Act. The in India have given sanction to all forms of opening up the possibility of a veritable same year a petition was sent to the Petitions sexual expression including homosexuality; quantum leap. Committee of parliament seeking decri- -Medical establishments all over the world So far all the various 'bachao' andolans minalisation of homosexuality by repealing (WHO, American Psychiatric Association) have focused on the plight and rights of those Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. accept homosexuality as normal behaviour victimised by the prevailing model of As an organisation fighting on AIDS and not a disease. development. A decade of these struggles related issues, ABVA is also - Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code has created enough public debate to establish involved in campaigning for gay rights, of 1860, drafted during British colonial rule that there is an apparent stalemate between homosexuals being particularly vulnerable in India with a view to punish and criminalise the beneficiaries and victims of to victimisation in the prevailing anti-AIDS consensual sodomy, is now antiquated, 'development1. But is a significant, national, frenzy. Earlier, in November 1991, the group discriminatory and is a violation of the political mobilisation feasible exclusively had released a citizens' report on the status individual's right to privacy. on behalf of the over two crore people of homosexuality in India entitled Less Than - The concept of human rights stands displaced since independence? The move­ Gay which had included repeal of Section extended to people with different sexual ment groups argue that those physically 377 in its charter of demands. Finally, last orientation as prescribed in the London displaced from their homes are Only the most year in April 1994, ABVA filed a petition Declaration of 1988. dramatic examples of victimisation and their in the challenging the The proceedings of the April 22 meeting struggle is Ofi bqrmlf of the vast multitude validity tatf Section 377. The action was in were not reported in the media for the simple left permanently below- the poverty line - response to theTihar jail authorities' refusal reason that the media was not invited to be whether it is a landless labourer impoverished to supply condoms to inmates despite the present. In ABVA's experience, media marginal farmer or rag-picker in some known prevalence of homosexual practice treatment of this particular issue, that is metropolilan city. among prisoners and their consequent risk homosexuality, tends to be titillating and However, merely expahding the definition of exposure to HIV infection. sensational or insensitive and unthinking. of displacement may not be enough. The This was the background for a day-long ("Who arc the homosexuals in your group, central challenge is one of reaching out to meeting organised in Delhi this April to we will interview them.") Such an attitude the people who believe that a big dam will mobilise support for the public interest is not helpful in building up public under­ solve their economic problems. The Narmada petition for which hearings have already standing of, and sympathy for, trie central Bachao Andolan, for example, has succeeded begun. The meeting took place on April 22. issue which is: people with homosexual in building a ease for the oustees but not yet soon after it was reported that a Tihar jail preference are not abnormal, immoral or

Economic and Political Weekly February 3, 1996 257 licentious, they should not be treated as in the west tend to give little importance to two kinds of reactions on homosexuality. In criminals or be discriminated against. similar initiatives in this country except in India an organisation like the Indian Medical Incidentally, a review in Sunday had a totally counter-productive way as described Association (IMA), not exactly famous for described Less Than Gay as "pornographic' at the outset. However, ABVA mentions that its espousal of human rights causes, has and it was only after an 18-month battle in a few Delhi newspapers have recently carried supported repeal of Section 377 and has chosen the Press Council that the magazine agreed edits calling for repeal of Section 377. to pronounce that homosexuality is not a to publish ABVA's rejoinder. Even within 'progressive' circles there disease. This was last year, in response to In the Indian milieu it seems to be an uphill appears to be ignorance and prejudice on the reports of HIV positive cases in Tihar jail and task to tackle public prejudice on this topic. subject of homosexuality. None of the civil IMA's recognition of the fact that condom At the April 1995 meeting the advocate who liberties groups have so far listed gay rights supply would not be taken up unless Tiled ABVA's petition in the high court spoke as an item on their agenda though ABVA homosexuality is decriminalised. This is one of the initial hostility of the judges. They activists tell me that they have been kind of reaction-supporting gay rights because wanted to know: does ABVA favour free sympathetic and supportive during dis­ it is necessary for AIDS control and prevantion. sex? Does ABVA want AIDS to spread (by cussion. At a PUCL-NHRC seminar held in The second kind of reaction is a streng­ promoting homosexuality)? They were not March this year, ABVA was given an thening of the attitude that it is 'these homo­ responsive when told of WHO guidelines for opportunity to present its viewpoint on gay sexuals' who are responsible for the AIDS supplying condoms in prisons for AIDS rights. epidemic and therefore they should be prevention. Reportedly the judges' attitude It is relevant to note that the women's suppressed not encouraged. This attitude changed when seniof advocates appeared in movement in the west has gone through appears to be hardening in countries like the the court to argue the case. Another point intense conflicts among feminists regarding US. An article in the Nation (March 20) by made at the meeting was that doctors and lesbianism and women's rights. In India the Meredith Tax says: "Homosexuality has lawyers who are aware of the public health first time that this issue was taken up at a become the anathema of the religious right, angle to this issue (leave aside the human public forum was only last year at the national replacing abortion". The author's book, rights aspect for the moment) have been women's conference in Tirupati in January Families, which was being used as a textbook unwilling to take a public stand. 1994. And women's groups by and large in the first grade Family Life Education It should be noted that even Amnesty have not initiated action in response to the curriculum was withdrawn after a campaign International took a long time to accept that cases of harassment of occasionally by conservatives, because "there's a homosexual preference is a human rights reported in the press over the last few years. couple in the book". Used for eight years issue. The subject has been debated within Last year a woman leader of the CPI had 'without complaint' in Fairfax County Al from 1979 onwards and only in 1985 issued a statement lashing out at homo­ (Virginia) schools, it was removed after a began to crystallise into a concrete stand. sexuality. It was in the context of a proposal controversy in 1993 and replaced by one A 1987 AI report detailing its research pro­ to hold an international gay rights meet in which contained "no one who might be a ject investigating into persecution of homo­ India and while I cannot recall the text of lesbian". sexuals throughout the world has a comment the statement. I think it was something to In India it might take a lot more struggle by the researcher assigned to the project to do with permissiveness and decadence. before gays and lesbians can come out of the effect that Amnesty's stand still contains But coming back to the question of the law, the closet, leave alone for them to be portrayed anomalies which need to be set right. This obviously legal sanction for homosexuality in school textbooks. Right now the task on is particularly in relation to the category of is not a guarantee for its social acceptance. hand is to get Section 377 repealed and for prisoner of conscience' which needs to be The country wise status described in the that the support of all progressive groups, widened in scope so as to ensure a more Amnesty report amply bears this out. particularly those involved in civil rights is comprehensive protection of the right to Meanwhile, the AIDS scare has resulted in necessary. sexual preference. The Amnesty report contains an exhaustive listing of the law in different countries as well as the forms of victimisation that gays are being subjected to. In , for example, the topic is not mentioned in the law but in actual practice homosexuals are being persecuted under article 158 of the Criminal Law (disturbance against the social order). And in the USSR (the report was compiled before the collapse of the Soviet Union) male homosexual acts are illegal under article 121 of the Penal Code, while punishment is known to have taken the form of psychiatric treatment and drugs to "convert the homosexual into a heterosexual". I mention China and USSR to emphasise that this is an area where the Left and the Right appear to think alike. The gay rights movement in the US does not need to be described since it has had continuous media coverage over the last few years. In fact Indian newspapers which faithfully carry reports on gay demonstrations

258 Economic and Political Weekly February 3, 1996