Why are people in India not accepting homosexuality?
To understand any concept about India, one needs to realize that India is a diverse nation with a population of 1.3 billion people. The culture, beliefs, religion, and political opinion are different. The only accepted norm in this country is conservatism. Religion plays a major factor in shaping one’s mind, every religion somewhere or the other repudiates homosexuality. The LGBTQ community has come a long way in breaking stereotypes, unwrapping misogyny, and showing the world that love has no boundaries. While some see homosexuality as a disease, some say it's just a western influence and some see it as a natural thing.
Section 377 :
Section 377 of the Indian Penal code was passed during the British Raj in 1860. This law prevented any kind of sexual activity that was against nature, also oral and anal sex were a crime under this law. The British had instilled the minds of the people with what they thought was exemplary. Anyway, The Naz Foundation and various other trusts had been working for decades to decriminalize homosexuality. In 2009 after the Delhi high court gave a judgment that ‘the rights to dignity and privacy within the right to life and liberty guaranteed by Article 21 (under the fundamental Right to Freedom charter) of the Constitution, and held that criminalization of consensual gay sex violated these rights.’ Many religious groups like All India Muslim Personal Law Board, Utkal Christian Council, Apostolic Churches Alliance, Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights, Tamil Nadu Muslim Munn Kazhgam, S.D. Pratinidhi Sabha, Raza Academy, Ram Murti, Bhim Singh, B. Krishna Bhat apart from Tijarawala, JACKINDIA, and B.P. Singhal appealed against the judgment. The LGBTQ filed petition after petition but got dismissed by the court most of the time, finally, in 2018 the Constitution bench of Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, Justices Rohinton Nariman, DY Chandrachud, AM Khanwilkar, and Indu Malhotra decriminalized section 377 by quoting “Take me as I am. I am what I am.” This was a landmark judgment given by the Supreme court of India.
In 2015, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor had introduced a Private Member’s Bill in the Lok Sabha which was voted out since most of the Members of Parliament are super religious or are archconservative.
Religious groups have always shown a red light to the roads of progress. Take for example the film “Fire” had generated a lot of buzz during the late 1990s. The film portrayed two women in a “lesbian relationship” this was just another excuse for the Shiv Sena to vandalize public property. Theatres were attacked, posters were burnt and the then Chief Minister of Maharashtra Manohar Joshi supported this act of violence done by the Shiv-sainiks. The Bajrang Dal started riots in Surat burning down theaters, attacking the audiences. The BJP was also involved in burning posters of the film in Kanpur. There were many films made on the concept of a same-sex relationship. The latest one released was in 2019 “Subh Mangal Zyada Savadhan” where Ayushmann Khurrana’s character is gay.
There are more famous personalities who oppose the idea of homosexuality, making it sound like a disorder. In 2013, Baba Ramdev the famous Yoga guru and entrepreneur said “I invite the gay community to my yoga ashram and I guarantee to cure them of homosexuality.” Yes, this guy has millions of followers across the country and he is also one of the richest people living in this country.
In conclusion, the LGBTQ community always wanted to have their rights, always wanted to be accepted in society. But they couldn’t for so many years because of the homophobic nature of the society. People before were not educated about this forget homosexuality even today we don’t talk about sex openly. Nonetheless, we are educated, we know what should be acceptable and what shouldn’t be. This is the time we support the LGBTQ community, stop being conservatives; our ancestors had spent their lives being that, welcome a change, we have many more issues to deal with in this country.
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