http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/news/insight/story.html? id=1f5222a2-c6d9-41b6-83e8-a6354ed58974
India: 'Shame is still there' It's not easy to be openly gay in India, where homosexuality, despite long being part of society, is viewed with revulsion. And some see lavish funding for the battle against AIDS as a gay fifth column MIKE MCPHATE Freelance October 3, 2004 When Raju Sharma's father discovered his son was gay two months ago he got a rope. He hung Sharma, 23, by the ankles from the first-floor balcony of their New Delhi flat, and threatened to kill any neighbour that tried to rescue him. Sharma says he dangled for an hour before his dad pulled him up, stripped him naked and tossed him into the street. He stood there sobbing, covering his genitals with his hands, while onlookers mocked him for lacking the courage to fight. "My father is quiet now," says Sharma, a slight man with a lisp and plucked eyebrows. "But the shame is still there." >From the people who view them as freaks, to a government that threatens life imprisonment for gay sex, Indian society treats its gays pitifully. A powerful social stigma has long kept the country's gay minority in hiding, often under the cover of unhappy heterosexual marriages. Over the last decade though, as a liberalizing economy has funneled in foreign attitudes as well as foreign wealth, a nascent gay movement has sprouted among India's middle class. Gay Web sites and hangouts have proliferated, especially in the capital New Delhi and the southern city of Bombay. Groups working on gay issues have grown from only two in 1994 to at least 50 today. And in the summer of 2003 several dozen activists waved rainbow flags in the streets of Calcutta for the country's first gay pride parade. The movement has not included significant numbers of lesbians due to the inferior status of women in the Hindu-majority country. Most Indians though say they are disgusted by homosexuality. Conservatives have responded angrily to the coming out. "(The gay movement) is one abysmal, absurd thing that is happening," says Navin Sinha, an official with the Hindu right- wing Bharatiya Janata Party. "For 1,000 years in our culture these two things you have mentioned - I don't even want to say the words - they have not been there," says Sinha, referring to homosexuality and lesbianism. The gay movement was spurred in part by the fight against AIDS. With over 5 million infected, India is second only to South Africa in total AIDS cases. While the government estimates that over 80 per cent of HIV transmissions in India occur among heterosexuals, the virus is highly concentrated among gay men. A survey this summer in Bombay found that 20 per cent of the city's gay men are HIV-positive. Three years ago two AIDS outreach groups began a campaign against a 140- year-old ban on sodomy, known as Section 377, which they say has impeded their education efforts in the gay community. "It's an absurd law," says Vivek Divan, a gay-rights lawyer. "Distributing a condom is like aiding and abetting a crime." Although the law is very rarely used to prosecute gays, activists say it is used regularly by police to terrorize gays. Ashu Seghal says two neighbourhood cops who knew he was gay raped him last winter. As he was walking home one night, the officers, stinking of rum, rolled up beside him on a motorcycle, Seghal said. They dragged him by the collar to a nearby police booth, lashed him with a bamboo stick, beat his head against a wall and finally forced him to give oral sex - to the tall one first, the one with the pot belly next, he says. Seghal, a stern 26-year-old with henna-dyed hair, says he tried to seek justice, but the cops' superiors told him if he filed a complaint he'd be arrested under Section 377. "They told me to forget it as a bad dream," he says. This month India's High Court rejected on procedural grounds a petition to repeal the law. Government lawyers argued in their affidavit that "Indian society by and large disapproves of homosexuality." "Deletion of the (law) can well open the flood gates of delinquent behaviour," they warned. Many Indian conservatives see the drive for gay equality as an attack on the country's soul with its deeply held traditions of extended families and arranged marriages. Several push the theory that India is the victim of a covert gay invasion from the west. A popular columnist Swapan Dasgupta last month cautioned of a "new gay evangelism." "Of particular concern to many is the possibility of the lavishly funded anti-AIDS campaign being misused to create a gay network," he wrote. Homosexuality in fact has a long history on the subcontinent. Same-sex relationships are described in ancient Indian texts like the 4th-century love guide the Kama Sutra, the classic Hindu saga the Ramayana, and medieval Persian and Urdu poetry. "Homosexuality is not a fashion that can be introduced from one place to another," says Ruth Vanita, co-author of Same Sex Love in India. "It is a facet of human existence, attested in all societies throughout history." Leaders of India's gay movement say they are prepared for a long battle. Anti-gay feelings may have hardened for the moment says Shaleen Rakesh, leader of the gay outreach group Naz Foundation, but at least the subject is being addressed. "Homophobia is better than indifference," he says. "These things take time." Mike Mcphate is a freelance reporter based in New Delhi. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads. Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for free! http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/WfTolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Group Site: http://www.gaybombay.info ========================== NEW CLASSIFIEDS SECTION SEEKING FRIENDS? VISIT www.gaybombay.info click on classified section and type your message in the post section once the link opens What's hot? What's not? Where are the LGBT parties being held and when? 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