Desicritics News

Sarah Palin Resigns: Aims to Run for President in 2012

temporal — Fri, 3 Jul 2009 16:26:04 EDT

photo NYT

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is set to resign this Friday. She would be handing over the reins to Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell. He would be sworn in on July 25.

This long speculated and anticipated announcement was made by Sarah Palin in presence of her husband Todd and other family members at her home in Wasilla, Alaska.

Mitchell Blumnethal, of NYT, quotes her saying, This decision came after much consideration,” Ms. Palin told reporters gathered at her home, and added, “I really don’t want to disappoint anyone with this announcement.”

Here is her full statement to the press:

“People who know me know that besides faith and family, nothing’s more important to me than our beloved Alaska,” said Governor Palin. “Serving her people is the greatest honor I could imagine. I am determined to take the right path for Alaska even though it is not the easiest path,” said Governor Palin after the announcement. “Once I decided not to run for re-election, I also felt that to embrace the conventional ‘Lame Duck’ status in this particular climate would just be another dose of ‘politics as usual,’ something I campaigned against and will always oppose. It is my duty to always protect our great state. With that in mind, my family and I determined that it is best to make a difference this summer, and I am willing to change things, so that this administration, with its positive agenda, its accomplishments, and its successful road to an incredible future, can continue without interruption and with great administrative and legislative success. I look forward to helping others – to fight for our state and our country, and campaign for those who believe in smaller government, free enterprise, strong national security, support for our troops, and energy Independence.” [link]

She would be the second Governor to resign to seek the Presidential nomination. Last month Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, also considered a leading Republican candidate announced that would not seek re election.

While her Conservative base would be pleased by her decision, it does not bode well for the process of electioneering in the US.

Already, the pundits have been decrying the long and expensive process that culminates in the Presidential campaign.

Delhi High Court Makes Consensual Gay Sex Legal

DeeptiA — Thu, 2 Jul 2009 14:30:06 EDT

The world over, different countries have different concepts revolving around homosexuality. There are states in the United States that have made marriage between homosexuals as having the same legal sanctity as that between a man and a woman, there are other states where this is a matter of huge debate and controversy (with the Catholic and Protestant churches being against it), countries in parts of Europe are liberal while those where the Church has a stronger influence are less likely, and there are the Islamic countries where the concept is abhorrent - forget marriage between homosexuals, even the concept of a relationship was unacceptable (for example, in Iraq, insurgents would target homosexuals for murder).

What about the thought of homosexuality in a country such as India, which has a long history, and where there is a lot of debate even among historians about whether homosexuality was prevalent in the past. India, till today, had a law called Section 377, that made homosexuality a crime (even among consenting adults). This law meant that even among groups with a higher risk pattern for AIDS (such as gays), it was difficult to really follow anti-AIDS programs since a number of people would hide their homosexuality, or not be open about it.

For the past several years, there has been a debate stoked by AIDS campaigners and gay rights groups about revoking this section of the penal code (it was introduced by the British in British ruled India in 1861, and is no longer prevalent in the Britain of today). However, attempts by the Government to do a debate on removing this section of the penal code runs aground due to opposition by religious groups (and there are enough people in each religious group to be outraged by the thought of homosexuality), so it would have seemed difficult by the Government to move fast on such a law. And then came this stunning judgment by the Delhi High Court (and interestingly, it uses the same argument as used by several US state courts, using the theory that such laws are violative of many of the equality and fundamental rights of citizens) (link to target):

In a breakthrough judgment, the Delhi High Court on Thursday legalised gay sex among consenting adults holding that the law making it a criminal offence violates fundamental rights. "We declare section 377 of IPC in so far as it criminalises consensual sexual acts of adults in private is violative of Articles 14, 21 and 15 of the Constitution," a Bench comprising Chief Justice A P Shah and Justice S Murlidhar said.

It further said that this judgement will hold till Parliament chooses to amend the law. "In our view Indian Constitutional Law does not permit the statutory criminal law to be held captive by the popular misconception of who the LGBTs (lesbian gay bisexual transgender) are. "It cannot be forgotten that discrimination is antithesis of equality and that it is the recognition of equality which will foster dignity of every individual," the Bench said in its 105-page judgement.

It is pretty much sure that there will be appeals to the Supreme Court by many sections of society, one only hopes that the Government will not try to get this judgment over-turned. At the same time, this is a judgment by the Delhi High Court, and is applicable in the capital city (even though it is a precedent that can be used by organizations all over the country); ultimately it is either the judgment of the Supreme Court or a law passed by Parliament that can ensure coverage across the entire country.

Delhi High Court Legalizes Homosexuality In India

Sanjukta Basu — Thu, 2 Jul 2009 01:50:03 EDT

History has been created today in India, this morning Delhi High Court gave its judgment on the petition filed by Naz Foundation challenging the constitutionality of Section 377 of IPC which criminalizes all acts of oral and anal sex between individuals irrespective of age and consent.

High Court ruled in favour of the petition and said,

We declare that Section 377 IPC, insofar it criminalises consensual sexual acts of adults in private, is violative of Articles 21, 14 and 15 of the Constitution. The provisions of Section 377 IPC will continue to govern non-consensual penile non-vaginal sex and penile non-vaginal sex involving minors. By 'adult' we mean everyone who is 18 years of age and above. A person below 18 would be presumed not to be able to consent to a sexual act.

Read the full judgment here.

The religious groups have already started reacting negatively. They say this is a sad day for civilised people. May their God help them.

The politicians are quiet and the Law minister said he would react after reading the judgment.

The road ahead is still long, the next struggles would be about homosexuals couple's property rights, adoption rights, marriage rights, domestic violence in intimate relations etc.

I have written more about this case earlier here.

A more detailed report in the making.

Delhi High Court Decriminalizes Homosexuality

Aaman Lamba — Thu, 2 Jul 2009 01:44:32 EDT

Society changes at the edges, at first in opposition andslowly, but then the torrent builds, until the barriers are broken. What seems impossible to accept and against the 'norms' of society is soon enough commonplace.
The battle to decriminalize homosexuality in India has been one such battle. While homesexuality has always been as much a part of Indian society as anywhere else, it has had to lurk in the shadows and be reduced to furtive fumblings in park bushes and bus shelters, increasing health risks. The right to walk tall and proud was denied. While the debate in Western countries shifted to securing equal legal rights, India was still applying Victorian laws to hold back the tide.

The Delhi High Court gave succour to everyone today by agreeing that the law was unfairly stated, and that Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which imposed a life sentence on those indulging in "carnal intercourse against the
order of nature" would only applly to cases involving children or non-consensual sex", as it rightly should. Thus, finding that it was a violation of Articles 14, 15, and 21 of the Indian Constitution, and of fundamental human rights. They asked the Government to implement the guidelines of the Law Commission in this regard and look at rewriting the law in question. They invoked Jawaharlal Nehru's committment to human rights and his "Objective Resolution" as well as the 'Inclusiveness' of the Indian Constitution. The entire judgement was ordered placed online immediately(PDF). The judgement goes into the history of anti-homosexuality laws dating back to the middle ages, and notes that Great Britain
decriminalized homosexuality between consenting adults in 1967 under the Sexual Offences Act. The petitioner, Naz Foundation, which had seen the same case dismissed earlier in 2004 on 'academic' grounds, had brought the case before the court "on the ground that HIV/AIDS prevention efforts were found to be severely impaired by discriminatory attitudes exhibited by state agencies towards gay community, MSM or trans-gendered individuals, under the cover of
enforcement of Section 377".

The Court noted that

A rather peculiar feature of this case is that
completely contradictory affidavits have been filed by two wings of Union of India. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) sought to justify the retention of Section 377 IPC, whereas the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare insisted that
continuance of Section 377 IPC has hampered the HIV/AIDS
prevention efforts.

It noted the MHA affidavit was not well supported in terms of evidence, and there was more weight to the Health affidavit. Shocking notes on abuse of LGBT persons is recorded in the judgement, including the "Bangalore incident
of 2004". It applied the principle of 'severability' in delinking the decriminalization of adult homosexual acts from the continuing applicability to crimes against children and non-consensual acts.

There is much more ground still to be covered, and appeals against this decision are likely, but Incoming Addl Solicitor General Indira Jaisingh said she expects the Govtnot to be swayed by religious/moral arguments if any appeal was filed. On the other hand, All Indian Muslim Personal Law Board member Kamal Farooqui calls it a sad day for "civilised people".(Notes from href="http://www.twitter.com/gay_india">@gay_india)

Democracy was seen to hold fast in India today, and the fight must go on.

Mozilla Firefox 3.5, Plays Catchup, Sets Stage For Future

Aaman Lamba — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:57:48 EDT

Mozilla Firefox 3.5 was released today to some acclaim. While it will doubtless break all previous records of the most downloads, it brought little overtly new to the browser landscape that was not already available in Google Chrome, Apple Safari, or Microsoft Internet Explorer. That being said, some features that come with the browser could prove more useful as websites adapt to them.

Private browsing, tearaway tabs, and faster JavaScript engines - we're getting inured to the rapid pace of innovation in browsers, and look for something revolutionary. Two features that might address that yearning are the support for HTML 5 and for location-aware sites.

When you visit a location-aware site, Firefox 3.5 asks you if you would like to share your location information with the site, and this provides you location-specific information, such as movie listings, restaurants, etc. The browser determines your location using Wi-Fi data, IP lookups, and Google Location Services. Unfortunately, you'd be hard-pressed to find too many sites that support this feature just yet, but one can envisage an array of hyperlocal services that will leverage this ability soon. There's no way to grant blanket permission to all sites to broadcast your location information, which is probably the best approach.

HTML 5 support is another aspect that the average user might not care about today, but features like embeddable video using the video tag and the Ogg Theora format (no more Flash plugins, etc), offline storage, web workers, etc., will mean the most significant transformation of the Web over the next couple of years since, well, Netscape's IPO.

Under the hood, the TraceMonkey JavaScript engine, faster startup, the usual ACID-compliance to standards, and extension support, still make Mozilla Firefox 3.5 the browser to beat. Almost all my extensions loaded or updated seamlessly post the upgrade.

It would have been good to see more social media aware features, such as the ones in Flock or perhaps Semantic Web browsing-related capabilities, but the Firefox 3.5 release is an important one, not least because it sets the stage for future enhancements like Snowl, Weave, and Jetpack.

US Troops Withdraw From Key Iraqi Cities

DeeptiA — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 07:59:37 EDT

Most people now recognize the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 to have been a mistake, given that it had negative consequences in a variety of different areas (we'll talk about that later). The invasion led to Iraq becoming a magnet for Islamic fighters from all over, unleashed the sectarian divisions that had been brutally suppressed by Saddam Hussein, led to horrific casualties among the population in the fighting that followed, and scared the neighboring countries (other than Iran), since it led to a Sunni ruled state becoming a Shia ruled state. It also put the United States in a position which was deemed comparable to Vietnam in the sense that mere military might did not lead to a winning position, and dealt huge blows to the armed forces of the US (to both the regular army and to the National Guard).

The issue about getting the army back from Iraq played a major role in the last Presidential campaign, and there is a lot of pressure on Obama to bring back the military; with majority public support being to bring back the army. For many years, it was unclear as to what the timeline for this would be ! However, in the last year or so, the US finally managed to get the right alliances (including with the Sunni minority, elements of which would have been fighting the American forces just a few months back). It was only this reduction of violence, along with fledging steps taken by the Iraqi army and police force (another self-created problem - the initial US head of the Provisional Authority had dissolved the Iraqi army as a contaminated Baathist organization without making any contingency plans). The situation in Iraq now, although not as secure as the US would have liked to see in an ideal world, is enough that the US is able to do the major symbolic action of withdrawing its forces from 6 major Iraqi cities (link to article):

US troops are withdrawing from towns and cities in Iraq, six years after the invasion, having formally handed over security duties to new Iraqi forces. A public holiday - National Sovereignty Day - has been declared, and the capital, Baghdad, threw a giant party to mark the eve of the changeover. US-led combat operations are due to end by September 2010, with all troops gone from Iraq by the end of 2011.

Some 131,000 US troops remain in Iraq, including 12 combat brigades, and the total is not expected to drop below 128,000 until after the Iraqi national election next January. The US Ambassador to Iraq, Christopher Hill, said there would be no major reduction in forces until next year but the pullback was a "milestone".

The current Iraqi Government is treating the event as a major watershed in its regaining total control of Iraq, since the presence of US troops in the cities ensured that the Iraqi Government could not take many steps that they would have liked (such as when the Government wanted to apply pressure on Sunni sections in the cities, they had to face some resistance from the US army). With the general elections also due in the next few months, the Iraqi Government is sure to use the opportunity to claim this withdrawal as a victory.

However, the withdrawal does not really reduce the number of troops in the country, and many of the problems that Iraq faces are still there:
1. Security remains a problem
2. Simmering tension between the Sunni and Shia factions remains in place, increased by the impending elections and signs of fraud
3. The army and police are still not upto the required level of training, and not free from factional bias

The Death Of A King: Michael Jackson Passes Away

Aditi Nadkarni — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 10:53:13 EDT

Michael Jackson is gone. He was my very first introduction to pop music, our generation's pop music. If it weren't for him, our times would not have had any star to show for itself, no Elvis, no Beatle mania. We from the 90s would have passed by without a craze. Instead the 90s gave the world its King Of Pop. His biggest and best selling albums were made popular by my generation. We were the teenagers who followed his moonwalking footsteps and filtered his lyrics through the funnels of our walkman headphones. I remember hearing the scream, the sounds of shattering glass weaved into his music, the irreverant howl, the vulnerable quiver of his voice and the startling hiccup that punctuated his songs so in contrast to the steady, unbroken, melancholy notes of Indian music. It was different, like nothing I had ever heard before and so a pre-teen eager for something to define me, I fought valiantly for rights over the sole music system which my father's Jagjit Singh and Ghulam Ali albums had monopolized for preceding years.

At my all girl's convent school, every annual function had a dance on a catchy Michael Jackson number. Girls dressed in black and white, with big plastic hoops for earrings performed what could not really be called a break dance but when the famed "crotch" move came along, howls ensued from the crowd and loud clucks came forth from the nuns. In an otherwise solemn classroom, when Sister Maria asked us who was the first man to walk on the moon, our whispered answers amidst suppressed giggles included "Michael Jackson". In India, somehow we never saw Michael Jackson as Whacko Jacko. For us, he was merely this one representation of what the West itself was: eccentric, different, crazy and laden with bling-blings. If you asked a kid off the streets what America was to him, he would promptly say "Michael Jackson" and bust a break dance move. Johny Lever even created an Indian counterpart including "Mai-ka Lal Jaikishan" (Mother's pet, Lord Krishna) for one of his comic routines and everybody in audience, young or old knew whose name he was parodying.

When Michael Jackson arrived in India, even the usually Hindutva and nationalistic fervor ridden Bal Thackeray was smitten, raving to delighted news reporters about how MJ had stopped at his home and used his toilet. The concert was something I could not even dream of attending. Instead I fed on the remnants of the wave that his arrival set forth in Bombay. Riding on the buses the next day, we pointed to each other, flyers and posters of the concert and the places that we speculated MJ must have surely passed through on the way to his hotel. "Look", we cried excitedly, "They said he stopped there before they drove from his hotel to the concert!". Street children wore the one white glove symbolic of the King's visit and street hawkers made a killing selling MJ hats with a lock of curly hair attached. I was one of Bombay's teeming middle class. being part of the concert was not for us unless its traffic manifestations counted. We only took pride in the fact that MJ had decided to visit our city. He knew he had fans here, we told ourselves and therefore he knew us at some level. He had come all that way to our city and bathed it with his music, matched the beat of our crowded local trains with the rhythm of his songs and even put in a bharatnatyam dancer in his album. He acknowledged us and we loved him for that. He folded his hands and said namaste and even the grandmothers dismissive of his moves were touched. Mai-Ka-Lal-Jai-Kishen.

At my own grandmother's house, there lived a beautiful new god that had just made its way into India: cable TV. This tele-caravan of non-stop entertainment brought with itself, MTV and VTV. I watched MJ move around Naomi Campbell crooning "In The Closet" and that to date remains my favorite dance MJ number, its sensuality somehow ripening with age, mine and the song's. At thirteen, this to me was sex in the West. A voluptuous, scantily clad woman sashaying with a tall, frail man clutching his crotch. One monsoon day on our way to a movie theatre, the shattering of glass and a well-delivered scream in Jam, startled my dad when maneuvering our fiat through Bombay's tricky traffic. And much to my dismay MJ was banned from playing in our car.

"Do you even know what he is saying? Can you even tell?" my mother asked one day, challenging my adoration as I stared into the TV and let the the beats consume me. I turned up the volume and pretended to ignore her but her comment set me off. Up until then I did not understand his accent. I only knew that the beats of his songs excited me and made me want to dance. So the next time I made sure to look through the little lyric booklet that came with the cassette and learned a new language, his language. Suddenly, I was even more in love, not just moving with the beats and humming the tune but singing with the song. My mother immediately regretted having unintentionally led me into this karaoke phase. As I recognized the words, the message in "Black or White" and the angst in "Stranger In Moscow" were delivered with the beats. When our richer cousins bought a gigantic stereo system with speakers in every corner of the room, consumed with a mixture of pride and envy,I feigned nonchalance but only until "Blood On The Dance Floor" made its way into my tapping feet through their shuddering marble floor. I had never heard an MJ song being played like that before, at such a dangerous volume.

Through all his legal trials and the plastic surgeries, it became somewhat shameful or embarassing to admit that you liked him and adored him. And yet his music remained his one true face, untarnished and whole bringing discotheques alive when the 90s were called upon. Yesterday, I got back after a long day at work and just as suddenly as the shattering of glass and his trademark howl had entered my world, startling me years ago, I found out he was dead. I felt an urgency to listen to one of his songs. It is amazing how a tune can transport one back into the time to which that music belongs. Last night, I sat on my sofa, turned up the volume, closed my eyes and was a teenager again.

"Do you remember the time, when we were in love. We were young and innocent then"

Nandan Nilekani to Become Chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India

Ganadeva Bandyopadhyay — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:06:37 EDT

With the news of accepting the challenge of being the Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India(UIDAI), a Cabinet Minister ranking post, Nandan Nilekani adds another notable milestone in his eventful career.

He is one of the few leaders in contemporary corporate India with a grasp on a wide range of issues tackled by present day India. With the invitation to Nandan, the current Indian PM has made the best possible effort for this important project. In the times of terrorism and internal disturbances affecting our part of the world, identification of citizens is one of the essential tasks before the government. This is in addition to the day to day administrative requirements for unique identification for the purposes of issuing voter id cards and running schemes like the Nehru rozgar yojana, etc. On closer introspection of the concept of the UIDAI, it would be better for the average public to know the flaws of the current identification and documentation systems followed by Government of India requiring the establishment of this new body.

Without a doubt, the experience of raising, managing and giving direction to one of the globally prominent Indian IT players,namely Infosys raises high expectations from Nandan as well as increases the profile of this project.

Nandan Nilekani was put into public glare of average Indian and not just the India techie with the publication of the recent book Imagining India. There was this type of question question frequently asked by the audience on talk shows of various Indian channels wherever Imagining India was discussed and that is why are the brightest corporate minds not involving themselves with governance.

After proving his understanding in depth and breadth of the problems plaguing India since Nehruvian times from the impressive book, one of the bold next steps is the current one taken by Nandan Nilekani. With high caliber technocrats like Nandan Nilekani and Montek Singh Ahluwalia and a career diplomat like Shashi Tharoor getting into important government positions, the current PM has made the intentions clear of tackling the problems typical to Indian conditions with the best possible foot forward.

Some of the biggest problems to be tackled undoubtedly remain the growth of the peace processes and mutual interaction among the shared cultures rent apart by problems of terrorism and internal security in South Asia,the small trickle of high quality research and development, the stench emanating from the water-tap type of higher education system with millions of bright students getting slotted within less number of high quality institutions, the throttling of competition within education instead of letting competition improve the education process.

One can only hope such imaginative and bold steps by leaders of non-political fields such as Nandan Nilekani herald the long-awaited arrival of a developed country and region onto the global stage.

Michael Jackson, King of Pop, Dies of Heart Attack

Aaman Lamba — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:03:25 EDT

The world's greatest musician of our generation, or at least the one with the greatest acclaim once upon a time, passed away due to a heart attack at the age of 50 in Los Angeles. He had been preparing for a comeback/farewell concert tour in London from July until next year.

The rise and fall of Michael Jackson is perhaps one of the strangest odysseys of any public icon. From the early years with the Jackson 5 and a gruelling road show circuit to the superstardom of the 1980s, Michael Jackson became the biggest music star in the world, selling over 750 million copies. From albums like Thriller to Bad, singles that over half the world recognizes became anthems, leading, in part, to the rise of MTV, hundreds of copycat artists, the sound of the '80s, and much moolah for the music industry.

Behind the scenes, Michael Jackson was a tormented, confused man, yearning for a lost childhood and descending into a private morass of sadness. He created a fantasy world for himself, and with all the wealth at his command, made it seem more real than the one he inhabited. His hangers-on got their piece of the pie, and allowed the decline from genius to degenerate while maintaining the outward persona of a kind, gentle superstar. The disintegration was complete when he was indicted in 2004 on charges of child molesting. Though later acquitted, he was never able to return to public limelight again, and subsequent forays were masked in a mixed bag of public revulsion and lukewarm commercial success. He moved to Dubai for a while, and the rumours piled up faster than the publicity machine could cover up.

The concerts were more to raise money to cover his mounting debt and extravagant lifestyle, besides make a safety net for his three children. His stake in the Beatles' music catalogue and in Sony/ATV Music Publishing will be under scrutiny. One hopes there will be no calvalcade of lawsuits and the like to eat away at his children's financial security.

His music legacy alone will ensure he is remembered for a long time. Music stations and television channels went into a Michael Jackson retrospective overdrive, blanketing the airwaves with hours of hits. Gossip Columnists were not so kind, PerezHilton being the most snide.

Go gentle into the black night, MJ, you will be missed.

Queer Pride India 2009: Celebrations in all Major Cities

Sanjukta Basu — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 05:20:59 EDT

‘Greetings from the land of the Sinful Kamasutra’ said Prince Manvendra Singh Gohil while opening the Euro pride 2008 at Stockholm. (Video) But how many of us know who he is?

Exactly a year ago I wrote about Prince Manvendra Singh on this space - my post ‘Its time to stand up and stand tall’ where I said

“only when the number of people identifying themselves as queer is large enough and the faces known enough will the society realize it is not something so unnatural after all. And this responsibility lies with LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) people themselves to come out of their closet and be confident of their sexuality. It's time to stand up and stand tall.”

And they did. In just one year, the queer movement in India has grown by leaps and bounds. There are more popular culture celebrities who now openly support homosexuality, most vocal of them being Celina Jaitley who have called out for supporting gay rights in India on her blog on Times of India. The last year or so saw movies like Partner, Dostana which had both explicit and implicit homo-eroticism and gay rights advocacy. While our cinema and advertisement have always had depiction of male homosexuality albeit in a funny and derogatory manner, we have been terribly silent over female homosexuality. This also changed (very insignificantly) in the recent past, a certain Virgin Mobile TV commercial is the case in point, where a girl tells her father that she is not interested in going out with this boy from her class. The father gets all worried thinking she might turn out to be a lesbian and insisted she goes out with boys more.

We have India's first ever transgender celebrity Rose Venkatasan on Twitter which in itself is a great sign.

Now India prepares for a never before celebration of Queer Pride with events and pride marches being planned in all of the 5 metros. The month of June is celebrated as queer pride month all across the world to commemorate the Stonewall Inn incident on 28th June 1969 and the series of protests that followed at the in Greenwich Village in New York. [Useful Link - list of queer pride march in other countries ]

Pride march is a way to tell the world that "we are who we are and we are not ashamed of our sexuality." It is also a way of saying that "we are not going to be cowed down by the norms set by society and wouldn't be ashamed of our sexuality even when we have to face ostracism." In India a pride march also means a protest against criminalization of homosexuality and the voices this year is loud and clear.

Bangalore

: Karnataka Queer Hubba 2009

Bangalore will kick start ‘The Karnataka Queer Hubba’ this Sunday, 21st June 09. The Hubba is a week long event celebrating queer pride with a series of interesting activities, talks, seminars, film shows etc running up to the Bengaluru Pride 09 on 28th June.

Some of the significant events lined up as part of the Hubba are: Queering the Pitch: Cricket Match on 21st June; Dalit-Sexual Minorities Dialogue on Stigma and Discrimination on 22nd June; Release of Human Rights Watch Report - This Alien Legacy: The Origins of “Sodomy” Laws in British Colonialism on 23rd Jun; Pirat Dyke Film Screening of One in Ten and Desert Hearts on 24th Jun; Public Discussion on Religion and Sexuality on 25th Jun; Story Telling Sessions on 27th Jun and more.

Pride march will begin at National College, Basavanagudi at 2:00 p.m and go up to Puttanachetty Town Hall via Sajjan Rao Circle and Minerva Circle and will culminate with a series of speeches as the crowd gather on the Town Hall steps. Last year the march was attended by as many as 600 people and this year the numbers are expected to be even higher.

The March and the Hubba are a collective effort of various organisations and individuals under the banner of Campaign for Sex-workers and Sexual Minorities Rights (CSMR)

(Official Website - For details, time, venue of the Hubba, Official Twitter)

Delhi

: Delhi Queer Pride 2009

Delhi would have its 2nd Queer Pride March on 28th Jun 09 at 5.30 pm starting from Tolstoy Marg to Jantar Mantar. This year it is expected to be attended by even greater number of people and is going to be much more fun and frolic with wedding bands, rainbow colored flags, fancy masks and lively people of all kinds. There would also be street plays and talks at the end of the march. Like Bangalore, the Delhi march is also being organised by LGBT people and allies under the banner of 'Delhi Queer Pride Committee' and not by any particular organization. The official blog of Delhi Queer Pride says, "Queer Pride is a celebration. It is about loving who we are, whether lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, hijra or straight, and affirming everyone's right to be respected." (Useful Link1, Link2, official twitter)

Chennai

This year Chennai would hold its first Queer pride march on June 28th, Sunday, 4 pm Marina Beach from the Triumph of Labour statue to the Mahatma Gandhi statue. The call to join the march goes out to Lesbian, Gay, Kothi, Aravani, Bisexual, Trans folks and Straight allies as they all enter Chennai to celebrate June as the pride Month. Besides the main march Chennai has also been organizing events to celebrate the pride all through the month of June.

The celebrations kick started on 5th of June by Amour, a multimedia Bharata Nathyam dance performance by Shanmugha Sundaram, produced by Sathir Natya and sponsored by Alliance Francaise of Madras and SAATHII.

On 20th June The Shakti Center and Human Rights Watch organized cultural performances and discussion on colonial origins and everyday impact of sodomy laws.

On 22nd June Monday, 6.30 pm, South Indian Film Chamber Theatre, Anna Salai, there would be a screening of the Oscar winning film ‘Milk’ as part of the South Indian Film Chamber's Oscar Film Festival, in association with the US Consulate.

On 26th June, Friday, 4 pm there would be held a ‘Support Group Meeting’ for parents and siblings of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Chennai. Facilitated by Center for Counseling, a non-profit organization, the meeting will provide a supportive and confidential space where parents and siblings can ask questions, get factual information, and most importantly, meet other parents who are struggling to cope with similar issues relating to their adult children.

(Useful Link1, Link2)

Mumbai

In Mumbai while the feelings and emotions to celebrate the pride perhaps remain the same the Mumbaikars prefer to call it the Queer Azadi March and it is held on 16th of Aug to signify the freedom movement for queer people in India. The emphasis of the march is more on the unjust law of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code that in effect penalizes homosexuality. To quote from the official blog, "The choice of date, 16th August, was in order to make a statement that while the rest of India had got its independence from the British on this date in 1947, queer Indians were still bound by a British Raj law (Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, introduced in 1860) and Victorian mores that have corrupted traditional Indian acceptance of alternate sexualities."

Planning is yet to begin with full force for 2009 Queer Azadi but small steps have already been taken. The intention is always to make it bigger than the last year so perhaps we would see a lot of interesting activities from the LGBT community in Mumbai in August. Meanwhile here's a link to the media coverage of last years queer azaadi.

Kolkata and Bhubaneshwar

Full fledged preparations are also on in Kolkata and Bhubaneshwar however the dates are not decided yet. Kolkata happens to be the first proud city in India to have held a gay pride parade way back in 1999. In 2005 the Rainbow Pride Week was celebrated from Jun 20 to Jun 25 with much stronger participation than before. The Rainbow week consisted of film shows, art exhibitions, discussions and dance performances all meant to create spaces for dialogue and understanding devoid of hate, stigma and harassment against LGBT community. The week long celebration concluded in Rainbow Pride Walk through Southern Avenue, Gol Park, Gariahat, Ballygunge and Park Circus.

This year the queer pride date is colliding with Kolkata's Municipal Elections so they are reconsidering 28th June as the pride date. I will update this space with more information as I get them.

More readings - 2005 report, 2007 report, 2008, Link4

I have not been able to find any more information about Bhubaneshwar except that pride march preparations is on for the first time there.

The next steps: United effort optimizing the use of New and Social Media

The above listing is enough to prove a point - a point that I have already repeated. It is now only a matter of time that we get rid of the archaic law. A petition filed by Naz Foundation is at its final stage in the High Court of Delhi. During the arguments hon'ble court have been pro LGBT rights in its observation. My personal thought is that right after these two months of queer pride celebration the Court would pick it up and give the final orders which would go down in the pages of history as the true freedom for queer people in India.

Meanwhile there are still more efforts required from Queer community. As more and more city join the queer pride celebrations there is a need of a common national body which could support/promote/document the movement. Right now each city is doing it at their own level but their has to be a unity, coordinated movement, an army of peace loving queer people need to be built which would continuously be negotiating with the lawmakers for recognition of homosexual relationships, family units, property distribution, domestic violence etc.

Use of new and social media is still very minimal in the civil society sector. Internet is the only medium which is static, you can't see the re runs of a TV news for more than 2 days, you won't find the newspapers of 2 weeks back but anything you document on your website or blog would show up on the search results even 10 years later. It is important to document the movement on internet. I for one couldn't find enough content on the Kolkata rainbow pride walk, they don't have a website or a blog yet which are much needed. As and when smaller cities join the movment it would get even more difficult to follow them all via mainstream media. None of the city organizers have thought of designing HTML support badges and banners to be put up on their website to support the pride which is what young techie India needs today.

Hopefully in 2010 when I come back to this space writing on this topic I would be updating you on the same.

Till then do show your solidarity by writing about it on your blogs, micro blogs, help the movement being documented, which ever city you are go ahead join the march, take photographs, videos, make films and upload them on youtube. Spread the joy put some more colors in your life.