The past decade has seen major ups and downs when comes to queerness in legality: from the 2009 Delhi High Court judgment decriminalizing consenting sexual acts in private to the 2013 Supreme Court verdict that brought back Section 377, to the 2018 verdict that led to it finally being read down. In 2014 the Supreme Court presented the progressive NALSA judgement but in 2016, the much disputed Transgender Persons Bill was passed in Parliament despite being against the wishes of the community and in stark contrast to the wording of the Supreme Court judgment. Moreover, outside of these LGBTQ+ specific legislations, there exist numerous laws that operate on non-inclusive and unequal grounds for queer and trans persons living in India. 

We open the evening with a presentation by Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy on their report Queering the Law: Making Indian Laws LGBTQ+ Inclusive. The launch will be followed by a power-packed conversation with incredible voices from QAMRA, a queer initiative working towards archiving queer histories of India with a view to document and preserve contemporary queer history. Their conversation will bring to light the lessons we can learn from the past to ensure justice in the present is just for all. 

The evening will end with a snack reception. The event is FREE and OPEN to all.

Disclaimer: Please note that seating at Culture Lab events is on first-come first served basis, and if the venue is full, the Culture Lab reserves the right to shut entry. Also, the Culture Lab does not permit any participant-audience members to engage in any marketing activity of their own with the other participant-audience members either during, before or after the Culture Lab events. Any person found to be doing so will be asked to leave and will be denied entry to attend our events at the sole discretion of the Culture Lab team. A request to our attendees to kindly not entertain any individual doing unsolicited marketing, and please report activities of this nature to our team. In case any attendee chooses to entertain anyone doing such unsolicited marketing, it will be at the risk of only the such participant-audience’s sole discretion and the Culture Lab will not in any way be responsible for any consequences thereon.