'Rainbow Habba' demands social inclusion for gender, sexual minorities

The event focused on the challenges faced by gender and sexual minorities in achieving acceptance from both society and their families and was held to commemorate the 55th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots.

Bengaluru: LGBTQIA+ rights group Sangama hosted 'Rainbow Habba' in Bengaluru on Friday. The event focused on the challenges faced by gender and sexual minorities in achieving acceptance from both society and their families.

The event was held to commemorate the 55th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, a defining moment for the international gay rights movement.

Rajesh Srinivas, activist and executive director of Sangama, noted that landmark judgments — such as the 2018 Navtej Singh Johar case, which decriminalised consensual same-sex relationships — have yet to lead to social and familial acceptance of the LGBTQ+ communities.

Without acceptance, forgetting becomes a survival strategy, said Vaishali, a transwoman from Dharwad.

"It hurts to forget our family, our loved ones, friends, the schools we studied in, teachers who taught us, and the neighbourhoods that raised us. But unfortunately, since none of them accept us, we end up running away from them to take shelter on the streets and become vulnerable to exploitation,” she said.

Another trans woman, Spoorthy, revealed the challenges for trans persons to rent rooms in safe neighbourhoods. They feel fear and humiliation when made to feel their very existence undermines the dignity of people around them, she added.

Nayana Motamma, Mudigere MLA, stated that while discrimination on religious and ethnic grounds is "unsurprising", the exclusion of gender and sexual minorities from society is deeply unnerving.

Stressing the need for unity within the communities to apprise the government of their grievances, former MLA Sowmya Reddy acknowledged the progress gender and sexual minorities have made over the past two decades. 

Parents who accepted their children’s sexuality and gender identity from across the state were felicitated.

Raju, father of Preetham, a transman from Chikkamagaluru, said transgender children need to be allocated an equal share in inherited property.

The Stonewall Riots, which took place in New York's Greenwich Village on June 28, 1969, sparked a wave of protests against police harassment of the gay community and ignited a worldwide movement for gay rights.