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50 LGBTQIA+ Collectives Write An Open Letter To The Chief Justice of India

Vaivab

To 

The Hon’ble Chief Justice DY Chandrachud 

Supreme Court of India 

Tilak Marg, New Delhi-110001 (India).

Date: 27/04/2023

We, the students and members of different LGBTQIA+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual and others) Collectives across various Colleges and Universities in India, urge the Supreme Court to take cognisance of the status of LGBTQIA+ persons and recognise the right to marry and the right to family for every individual, irrespective of their class, caste, race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, religion and disability in line with Article 14 of the Indian Constitution. 

Currently, India has the largest population in the world, who are in their formative years, going to schools and colleges to learn. Our shared experiences of learning in these educational avenues are not linked by the enjoyment of fundamental rights (equality, life with dignity, etc) but by being objects of passive and active forms of homophobia, transphobia, and queerphobia that transcend the overview of statutory guidelines on ragging, bullying, discrimination and various other institutional support (if any). Schools and Colleges as primary sites of socialisation, beyond the family, become the first public spaces for an individual to understand what it feels to be a right-bearing individual, and to first-hand experience social stigma. 

In 2011, the Census identified 54,854 transgender children in the age group of 0–6 years (most likely an underestimation), less than 0.0001% of these children completed their schooling. Trans-queer persons navigate a life of double standards, where we have to pass as cis-gendered and heterosexual to survive identity-based discrimination in our educational system – we read books that call us deviants, hear professors who chide us on our difference, peers who make us scripts of their jokes and administration who reduces us as human problems. The emergence of so many LGBTQIA+ collectives in the past years is a testament to the failure of the State in actively making space, starting conversations, and sustaining support systems to aid trans-queer students and their human development. People collectivise when those in power refuse to help. In the absence of any robust anti-discriminatory law for the LGBTQIA+ communities post NALSA vs UoI 2014 and Navtej Singh Johar vs. UoI 2019, we turn from the State to peers and partners to socially exist. We nurture and carve out our own constitutional spaces of equality, freedom and association in spite of legal non-recognition. We live an extra-legal life! 

The Constitutional promise of the Supreme Court of India in NALSA vs UoI 2014 and Navtej Singh Johar vs UoI 2019 of recognition, equality, dignity and privacy remains incomplete in view of the double standards that the State and its law create for us. Our education is reduced to a survival mechanism to evade or opt out of social humiliation and violence at homes, schools, colleges, workplaces and public spaces. The constitutional wheel of life is broken for us.

Today, we ask the highest court of the land to intervene and recognise our life’s work of finding love and acceptance under the right to personal liberty guaranteed under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. The law-making system of the largest and most plural nation refuses to recognise non-heteronormative marriages, partnerships and chosen families. This act formally pushes us back into violent and toxic spheres of family and schools/colleges who invest in our social ostracisation, correctional therapy, house arrest, and institutionalised deaths. 

We come together to demand an equal and dignified life as envisaged under the Constitution of India. 

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Undersigned and Endorsed on behalf of their respective LGBTQIA+ Collectives: 

  1. Vaivab Das (They/Them) – Indradhanu, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of IIT Delhi. 
  2. Vishvanath Bhaurao Falegaonkar (He/Him) –  Saathi, the Queer Collective of IIT Bombay.
  3. Nabeel (He/Him) –  Swikriti, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of IIT BHU, Varanasi.
  4. Divya Gupta (She/Her) – Unmukt, the gender and sexual diversity forum of IIT Kanpur.  
  5. Shivangi Patel, (He/Him) Astitva, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of IIT Dhanbad.
  6. Alok Das, (He/Him) and Shivangi Gupta (She/Her), Lambda, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of  IIT Guwahati.
  7. Garima (She/Her) – Vannam, the Queer Collective of IIT Madras.       
  8. Sneha Sundararajan (She/Her) – Qagaar, the Queer Collective of IIT Roorkee.     
  9. Monidipa Sengupta (She/Her) – Ambar, the Queer Collective of IIT Kharagpur.
  10. Ahhie (She/Her) – Orenda, Gender and Sexuality Club of IIT Gandhinagar
  11. Gaurav Sinha  (He/Him) – Satrangi, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of IISER Pune.
  12. [Name Redacted] (They/She/He) – Anchor, the Gender and Sexuality Cell of BITS Pilani.
  13. Srijan Pandey, (He/She/They) – Samatva, the Queer Collective of DTU (Delhi).
  14. Anu, (She/Her) –  IIScQ,  the Queer Collective of IISc (Bangalore).
  15. Dhaman Trivedi (He/Him) – Wajood, the RMLNLU Queer Supportive Alliance (Lucknow).
  16. Ansh Sharma (A/They) –  Queer-Feminist Collective Shaheed Bhagat Singh College (Delhi).
  17. Yashshree Shahare (They/Them) – Patang, the LGBTQIA+ Collective of IISER Mohali.
  18. Mx Yashika (She/Her) – Bahujan Queer Collective of Panjab University, Chandigarh.
  19. Vishwang Bhaskar (He/Him) – QUEst, the Diversity & Inclusion Society of IIM Bangalore.  
  20. Anamitra Roy (He/They) – IKQRAAR, the Queer Collective of IISER Kolkata.         
  21. Aaditya Singh   (He/They) – VenQueer, the Queer Collective of Sri Venkateswara College, Delhi.
  22. Hanisha (She/They) and Aryan Rana (He/Him) – Pride, the Queer Collective of RGNUL, Patiala.
  23. Sehar Sabharwal (He/She/They) – Pehchaan, the Queer Collective, unofficial Queer Collective of Jesus and Mary College, Delhi.   
  24. Shubh  (He/Him) – Affirmative, The LGBTQIA+ Collective of SGGSCC, Delhi University.
  25. Nidhi Mishra and Adhya Singh (She/Her) – INARA, the Queer Collective of National Law Institute University, Bhopal.           
  26. Paresh Hate (They/Them) – Hasratein: A Queer Collective, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
  27. Radhika Modi (She/Her) – Jamia Queer Collective, JMI New Delhi.
  28. Arnab Adhikari (He/Him) – Indradhanush, the Queer Affirmative of Zakir Husain Delhi College, University of Delhi.
  29. Esha Shekar (She/Her) – Queer Consortium, the LGBTQIA+ Support System of BITS Pilani, Hyderabad Campus.
  30. Priyash Soreng (They/Them) – Queer Straight Alliance, Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies, New Delhi.         
  31. Harsh Gupta (He/Him) – SAGA, the Queer Collective of Deshbandhu College, New Delhi.
  32. Vaishnavi V K (She/Her) and Diwakar F (He/Him) – SNU Queer Collective, Shiv Nadar Institute of Eminence, Delhi -NCR.
  33. Vansh Pupneja (He/Him) – Satrang@AUD, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar University, New Delhi.
  34. Ria Goel (He/Him) – Miranda House Queer Collective, Miranda House New Delhi.
  35. [Name Redacted] (She/They) – White Rose Club, Gargi College, New Delhi.
  36. Sayantani Biswas (She/They) – Abha, IISER Berhampur.        
  37. Priyansh Rastogi (He/Him) – GNFQ (Galgotias Queer Collective), the LGBTQIA+ Collective of Galgotias Educational Institutions.
  38. Twisha Singh (She/Her) – Rang – The DEI club of IIM Lucknow.
  39. Priyasha Sinha (She/They) – NALSAR Queer Collective, NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad.
  40. Shitoshna Rastogi (He/She/They) – The Pride Forum, Krea University.         
  41. Rishav Chourasia (He/Him) – ABES Engineering College Queer Collective, New Delhi.
  42. [Name Redacted]  (She/They) – Rainbow Dot, the official LGBTQIA+ support group of NIT Rourkela.  
  43. Gunika (She/Her) – The Colourful Collective, NLU Punjab.    
  44. Kaushek Haldar (He/Him) – Qurve, the LGBTQIA+ Alliance of IIT Hyderabad.           
  45. Nitish Dua  (He/Him) and Jagath V (He/Him) – BliSC-Q (Bangalore Life Science Cluster- NCBS, InStem, C-Camp, Tata Institute for Genetics and Society).
  46. S Geettika Narayani (She/Her) – Anchor (Hyderabad campus), the LGBTQIA+ Collective of BITS Pilani.
  47. Alankrit Gupta (He/Him) – NIT K Spectrum, NIT Karnataka (Surathkal).       
  48. Sriguna Reddy (He/Him) – Carys: The Student Committee of the School of Liberal Arts at Bennett University. 
  49. Trisha B (She/Her) – Queer Collective of Tripura Institute of Technology Tripura
  50. Zaheer (They/Them) – Huewoman, Queer Collective of Presidency University, Kolkata.      
  51. Arya (They/She) – The Q Word, the Queer Club of TISS Hyderabad.
  52. Vishnupriya (They/Them)  – SAGA UoH, the LGBTQIA+ collective of the University of Hyderabad.

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For any letter related queries – indradhanu.iitdelhi@gmail.com

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