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Pride and prejudice

Together for a cause Participants at a ‘Gay Parade’ march

Chennai’s LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) community and its staunchest supporters and allies have set a date with history. On June 28, the 40th anniversary of the historic Stonewall riots in the U.S., they will fly the rainbow colour s of gay pride high at the city’s first ever LGBT march, the ‘Chennai Rainbow Pride Parade 2009’ – just recently finalised following police permissions – right here on Marina Beach.

“This parade is for the sensitisation of the public at large; we’re saying that we exist, that we are human beings and we have human rights that are constantly being violated,” says Sunil Menon, out gay man, fashion designer and one of the city’s first gay activists, who co-founded the NGO Sahodaran. “It’s a show of solidarity, of Chennai’s sizeable LGBT community coming together with a contingent of friends, family and allies.” Other major cities in India – Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore – have conducted gay pride parades in the last couple of years, but this is the first time one has been planned in Chennai.

“This is a dream come true for a lot of people,” says T.D. Sivakumar of Sangama, the Bangalore-based NGO that has been working in Chennai for the last two years and one of the main organisers of the parade. “The event we conducted last year for Sunil Pant, Nepal’s first openly gay MP, attracted a lot of attention, and people started asking us — why hasn’t Chennai had its own parade? Is it that the city is too conservative?” The answer is clearly no. In fact, as Sunil points out, the city and the state are light years ahead of many others when it comes to addressing the issues of transgenders or aravanis. “Today, our ration cards give ‘transgender’ as an option, and — another first — government hospitals are offering free sex re-assignment surgeries,” he says. “Tamil Nadu is one of the most proactive states on sexual minorities issues.” There is, however, still a long way to go, and that’s what the Chennai Rainbow Pride Parade and the allied activities that have been conducted all through June (it’s declared internationally as Gay Pride month) are all about. “Just six months ago, a gay teenager was taken to a hospital on the outskirts of Chennai by his mother and given shock treatments to ‘cure’ him of his sexual orientation,” says Sivakumar. “Recently, a kothi (an effeminate gay man) was severely beaten up in Nagercoil because a man didn’t like sitting by him on a bus.” The discrimination is worse in rural areas, but is a part of daily city life too, from where you stay, to where you study or work. “For instance, if you’re looking for accommodation and your sexual orientation is obvious to the landlord, it’s almost sure you won’t get the place,” says Sunil.

No wonder then, that Sivakumar refers to gays and lesbians in the city as “the hidden population.” To Magdalene Jeyarathnam, director of the Centre for Counselling, giving that population a chance to celebrate together might be the most important thing about this march. “It’s a great place for them to meet people who accept them for who they are — either others from the LGBT community or straight allies such as myself — and validate their feelings and their attraction,” says Magdalene.

And for society at large, the hope is that this parade will set people along the road of acceptance, she says: “There are so many misconceptions about LGBT individuals … I want people to see they aren’t any different from your neighbours, that they’re as normal or abnormal as anyone else.”

June 20, 5.30 p.m. A cultural performance and a discussion on the colonial origins and impact of sodomy laws by The Shakti Center and Human Rights Watch at ‘Spaces’, No. 1, Elliots Beach Road, Besant Nagar.

June 22, 6:30 p.m. Screening of Oscar-winning movie “Milk” on Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in the U.S. at the South Indian Film Chamber Theatre, Anna Salai.

June 26, 4 p.m. A support group meeting for parents and siblings of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Chennai at the Centre for Counselling, No.18, Radhakrishnan Salai, 9th Street.

June 28, 4 p.m. onwards A parade along Marina Beach, from the Triumph of Labour statue to the Mahatma Gandhi statue. Participating organisations include Sangama, Sahodaran, Sahodari Foundation, The Shakti Centre, Centre for Counselling, Social Welfare Association for Men (SWAM), South India Positive Network along with other human rights and women’s rights groups.

All month long. The American Library displays books on the history of the gay and lesbian struggle for equal rights in the U.S. and works of literature by outstanding LGBT writers.

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