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India: Gays and Lesbians on the Road to Human Rights

By Surina Khan

At least three times in the last two weeks I have come across news items about India that reflect its complexity as well as the urgency of human rights work.

At the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), a U.S.-based non-governmental organization where I serve as executive director, we confront human rights violations against people based on their sexual identity, gender identity and HIV status on a daily basis. IGLHRC works to defend the rights of sexual minorities and people with HIV/AIDS everywhere.

My own journey from self-acceptance to activism was not an easy one. When I came out as a lesbian in 1990, I became very involved in lesbian and gay activism in the United States. At that time I had rejected my own Pakistani culture of birth because of the homophobia I associated with my family and with Pakistan. I could not reconcile my lesbian identity with my Pakistani American identity. No one should be alienated from her country of birth, her culture, her heritage — simply for being who she is.

My work at IGLHRC has allowed me to put both parts of my identity together. But this is not the reason I work at IGLHRC. I do this work because there are countless people who cannot take the same steps I did, who cannot put the pieces of their lives together, who are not free to chart their own paths.

Take for example a recent case in India regarding forced psychiatric treatment of homosexuals. According to a complaint filed with the National Human Rights Commission of India, a patient at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences was forced to receive almost four years of treatment aimed at the conversion of his homosexuality. The treatment had two components: counseling and drugs.

And yet we know that homosexuality is not a characteristic that can be changed with treatment. In the United States and in many other countries, psychological and psychiatric associations have renounced these conversion methods as ineffective and unethical. Most recently, in China the Chinese Psychiatric Association decided that homosexuality would no longer be considered a mental illness. We are making progress. And we are working with Indian activists to ensure that the same happens in their country.

Another case presents a different host of problems. We have received reports of police raids and arrests of HIV-prevention workers in the city of Lucknow, in Uttar Pradesh, India. The prevention workers were providing outreach to men who have sex with men. They ended up being accused under Article 377 of the Indian Penal Code. Article 377 prohibits “carnal intercourse against the order of nature,” and although homosexuality is not explicitly mentioned, it is implicitly understood by police and the courts to fall under this category.

This law stands as a constant threat to any kind of political organizing on rights for men who have sex with men in India. Even if it is not always used, it is on the books, and it can be used to control and impose fear. And yet we know that according to the United Nations, the mere existence of the law is a human rights violation, let alone the arrests themselves. In 1994 the United Nations ruled in the case of Toonen v. Australia regarding a similar law prohibiting sexual contact between consenting adult men in private. The United Nations determined that such a law contradicted the rights to privacy and non-discrimination.

It is at the United Nations, after all, where the Indian government delegate stood up for our rights this past June.

When the United Nations was holding a special session to deal with the HIV/AIDS epidemic, many groups were allowed to present their opinions. All but one. Ours. Simply because we represented a gay and lesbian organization, IGLHRC was crossed off the list. Eventually the issue was brought to a series of votes at the United Nations’ General Assembly, and the countries voted. We were reinstated and India voted with us. They did so, they said, because they understood that homosexuals were a ‘vulnerable population’ to HIV/AIDS and that no real discussion on the issue could take place without taking homosexuality into account. It was a brave vote, and one that would be soon contradicted by the reported police action in Lucknow.

We are still monitoring the situation in Lucknow, and we are also closely following the case for de-pathologizing of homosexuality in India. To put it in simple terms: Homosexuality is neither a crime nor a disease. But there are parts of the United States where homosexuality is still a crime, and there are even people and organizations in the United States that call for a cure from homosexuality. But as with India, we repeat what we have learned from our own experience: We are neither criminals nor sick.

What will happen in India only time will tell. There is a growing number of groups working on issues of sexual orientation there — at least 40 community groups identifying themselves and organizing around issues of sexual orientation. They take different approaches and claim different identities, from hijras, to kothis, to men having sex with men, to gays and lesbians. As they chart their path to acceptance and dignity, we will follow with our dedication and support.

Surina Khan is executive director of the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC). For more information about IGLHRC and about the cases mentioned above, please visit its Web site at http://www.iglhrc.org.