Gay Bombay: Globalization, Love and (Be)longing in Contemporary India (35 page)

The gay sidekick is a regular comic character in many Bollywood films from the 1990s onward, like
Hum Hain Rahi Pyaar Ke
(‘Companions on the Road of Love’, 1993),
Raja
Hindustani
(‘Indian King’, 1996) and
Taal
(‘Rhythm’, 1999); he has been replaced in more recent films like
Page 3

(2004) and
Let’s Enjoy
(2004) with the debauched, decadent gay designer, hitting on straight men with impunity for his own sexual gratification.

Very rarely, we manage to find somewhat complex gay characters

in films like
Bombay Boys
(1998) and
Split Wide Open
(1999), or
sensitive
hijra
portrayals in films like
Bombay
(1995),
Tamanna
(‘Desire’, 1997) and
206
Gay

Bombay

Darmiyaan
(‘In-between’, 1997). There have also been villainous
hijras
in
Sadak
(‘Street’, 1991) and the reality-inspired
Shabnam Mausi
(‘Aunt Shabnam’, 2005; the biopic of a high profile Indian
hijra
who was elected as a member of the legislative assembly in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh).184 The controversy that the lesbian-themed films
Fire
(1998; two sisters-in-law neglected by their respective husbands find comfort in each others arms) and
Girlfriend
(2004; obsessive lesbian ready to do anything to win her
girlfriend
back from a man) generate on their release, is well documented.185 And then, of course, there is 2003’s
Kal Ho Na Ho
(‘If Tomorrow Does Not Come’) and its arguably funny gay subplot between the two lead actors,186 along with a slew of releases in the same year with both disparagingly camp or comic (
Out of Control
,
Masti

[Mischief],
Mango Soufflé, Market
) and somewhat non-stereotypical (
Rules
,
Chameli, Hyderabad Blues 2
) characterizations that began full fledged mainstream media chatter about gay Bollywood.187

In 2006,
Quest
, a tedious and quite problematic look at the aftermath of a woman’s life after she catches her husband in bed with another man, managed to slip under the radar on to urban multiplex screens, do a fairly good amount of business and slip away quietly. By 2007, there seems to be gay reference in almost every second or third Bollywood release.
The Bong Connection, Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd., Marigold, Metro.…

So much so that the Gay Bombay mailing list has begun conducting an online Gay Reference Audit for Bollywood—or GRAB!188

I was in India in March 2005, when
My Brother Nikhil
, a Bollywood film dealing with the trials and tribulations of a gay champion swimmer who is found to be HIV positive (based on the real life story of Dominic D’Souza) hit the screen. My curiosity was piqued by the clever television promos, featuring a host of celebrities asking—‘I care for
My Brother Nikhil
, do you?’ When I went to see the film, I was blown away completely. As the
Outlook
magazine film critic wrote, the debutant director Onir had managed to tackle
‘homosexuality without treating it as an ugly joke, a dirty alliance or an aberration’; in itself a cause for celebration.

The gay relationship here is not designed to shock the audience or make them feel queasy but is so ‘normal’ that the two lovers seem just like any other couple—intimate yet jealous and insecure, happy but quarrelling, sharing and facing up to an imminent loss. It is the love and faith that matters, whether it is man-woman, man-man or woman-woman.189

Media Matters
207

Most of the mainstream English press was similarly deferential in the way they treated the film’s gay theme.190 There were also no angry protests from the cultural police and no theatre vandalism.191 But more than the press reactions and the absence of a voluble public outcry, what struck me most as I watched the film in a houseful multiplex in South Bombay, was the reaction of the audience. They really seemed to
get
it—there were no hoots, no uncomfortable coughing when the couple was together.

I was accompanied by a bunch of straight friends for
My Brother Nikhil
—

and while they had been uncomfortable discussing my homosexuality before, now they had a context to ask me all the questions that they had wanted to. As I walked out of the film screening, I could see and hear animated conversations being carried out among the other viewers about different aspects of the story and the homosexuality of the protagonist…

it was an extraordinary feeling.

I am also heartened to observe
Rules
director Parvati Balagopalan assert—

The gay couple was part of our script from the beginning. The movie spoke about various aspects of love and homosexuality is one of them. The movie was a discourse on love and we wanted to treat all kinds of love equally.

There was no criticism, because there was no sensationalism at all. It was treated the way any other normal relationship would be.192

Shifting to non-commercial cinema, Riyad Wadia’s
BOMgAY
(1996) is acknowledged as India’s first gay film while
Gulabi Aaina
(‘The Pink Mirror’, 2003) has the distinction of being India’s first
kothi
film.193 They have been followed by a succession of diverse works

1. Tirthankar Guha Thakurta’s
Piku Bhalo Achhey
from Calcutta (‘Piku is Fine’, 2004; a partly-fictional Bengali self-acceptance narrative) 2. Ligy J. Pullappally’s
Sancharam
from Kerala (
‘
The Journey’
,
2004; a lesbian love story set in the south Indian state of Kerala)

3. T. Jayshree’s
Many People, Many Desires
from Bangalore (2004; a documentary about the LBGT community in Bangalore)

4. Santosh Sivan’s
Navrasa
(2004; a look at the South Indian tran-sexual Araavani community)

5. Shohini
Ghosh’s Tale of the Night Faries
(2005; a debate over decriminalization of sex work, explored through the narratives of five sex workers from Calcutta)

208
Gay

Bombay

6. Sridhar Rangayan’s
Yours Emotionally!
(2005; a cross-cultural ‘gay’

love story this time)

7. Ashish Sawhney’s
Happy Hookers
(2006; a documentary about male commercial same-sex workers in Bombay)

8. Sridhar Rangayan’s
68 Pages
(2007; a HIV-themed drama, produced by the Humsafar Trust)194

However, these films have only been screened privately or at festivals (they were either denied a censor certificate or did not bother applying), thus limiting their audience reach, despite the favourable publicity they received.

NOTES

1. There have been recent attempts at beginning this archival process online, through blogs such as
Queer Media Watch
(http://qmediawatch.wordpress.com/about/) 2. In addition, for an examination of ‘queered’ Indian advertising, I recommend Ruth Vanita’s excellent essay ‘Homophobic Fiction/Homoerotic Advertising: The Pleasures and Perils of Twentieth Century Indianness’ in
Queering India: Same-sex Love and Eroticism
in Indian Culture and Society
(London; New York: Routledge, 2002), pp. 127–148.

3. Arjun Appadurai,
Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization
(University of Minnesota Press, 1996), pp. 63–64.

4. Ruth Vanita, ‘The New Homophobia: Ugra’s
Chocolate
’, in Vanita Ruth and Saleem Kidwai (Eds),
Same-Sex Love in India: Readings from Literature and History
(New York: Palgrave, 2001), p. 248.

5. Saleem Kidwai, ‘Introduction to Ismat Chugtai:
Tehri Lakeer
’, in Vanita and Kidwai (2001), op. cit., p. 289.

6. Ashok Row Kavi, ‘Homosexuals Meet’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 18 December 1981.

7. ‘Legalize Homosexuality’,
Onlooker
, 15–31 August 1977.

8. Mario D’Penha, Comments on ‘Legalize Homosexuality’,
Historiqueer
, 13 August 2004.

http://historiqueer.blogspot.com/

9. Ibid.

10. Mukund Padmanabhan, ‘The Love that Dare not Speak its Name: A Journey through the Secret World of the Indian Homosexual’,
Sunday Magazine
, 13 July–6 August 1988.

11. Mira Savara, ‘Who Needs Men?’,
Debonair
, April 1988.

12. Shridhar Raghavan, ‘Gay: Everything You Wanted to Know about Homosexuality but were Afraid to Find Out’,
Gentleman
, August 1991.

13. Anusha Srinivasan, ‘I Want My Sex’,
Mid-day
(Bombay), 30 June 1993.

14. Madhumita Ghosh, ‘Homosexuality: A Thorny Issue’,
Sunday Mail Magazine
, 1 September 1991.

15. For example—

(
a
) Soraya Khan, ‘Homosexuals—Should They Be Damned?’,
Deccan Chronicle
(Hyderabad), 14 August 1993.

Media Matters
209

(
b
) R. Raj Rao, ‘Where are the Homosexuals? You don’t have to Look too Far’,
Indian
Express
(Bombay), 2 September 2002.

16. Vijay Jung Thapa and Sheela Raval, ‘Sex, Lies, Agony, Matrimony’,
India Today
, 11 May 1998.

17. Kiran Manral, ‘Bi Bi Love’,
Saturday Times
(Bombay), 6 March 1999.

18. Sheela Raval, ‘Men on Call’,
India Today
, 27 January 2001.

19. Piyush Roy and Mamta Sen, ‘I Want to Break Free’,
Society
, October 2002.

20. Georgina Maddox, ‘Gay and Gloomy’,
Indian Express: Mumbai Newsline
,
24
June
2003.

http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=55715

21. Neil Pate, ‘Blackmailers Give Gays, Lesbians a Hard Time’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 16 July 2004.

22. Neil Pate, ‘Police Target Gays to Extort Money’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 24 August 2004.

23. Sweta Ramanujan, ‘Love in the Time of Cynicism’,
Indian Express: Mumbai Newsline
, 14 February 2003.

24. ‘No Gay Priests, We’re Indians’,
Mid-day
, 6 August 2003. http://web.mid-day.com/news/

city/2003/august/60407.htm

25. Leena Mishra, ‘Prisoners Turning Gay in Packed Cells’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 12 July 2004.

26. See Georgina Maddox, ‘Coming Out’,
Sunday Express
, 27 July 2003. http://www.

indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=28237

Shalini Nair, ‘Coming Out’,
Indian Express: Mumbai Newsline
, 13 July 2004. http://cities.

expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=91232

27. Shefalee Vasudev, ‘The Gay Spirit’,
India Today
, 2 August 2004.

28. ‘Gay Couple Stabs Each Other’,
News Today
, 27 May 1992.

29. Ramesh Babu, ‘Lesbians’ Death Wish’,
Sunday Hindustan Times
, 27 June 2004.

30. The female Aparna Mafatlal turned into the male Ajay Mafatlal in 2003 after a sex-change surgery. For an overview of the family feud as reported in the newspapers, see—

Swati Deshpande, ‘Bitter Mafatlal Feud Reaches Court’,
The Times of India
, 10 November 2005.

31. ‘2 NGO-run Gay Clubs Busted in Lucknow’,
Asian Age
(Bombay), 9 July 2001.

32. Reuters, ‘Police Busts Gay Clubs in Lucknow’,
Indian Express
(Bombay), 9 July 2001.

33. See—

(
a
) ‘NGOs Worry Over Arrest of Outreach Workers’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 16 July 2001.

(
b
) ‘City Stands Up for Lucknow Workers in Jail’,
Indian Express
(Bombay), 19 August 2002.

34. See—

(
a
) ‘Gay Club Running on Net Unearthed’—4 Arrested’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 5 January 2006.

(
b
) ‘Cops bust gay racket…’,
Hindustan Times
(Bombay), 5 January 2006.

35. ‘Homosexuality, a crime as heinous as murder’,
New India Press
, 11 January 2006.

http://www.newindpress.com/NewsItems.asp?ID=IE420060111045619&Page=4& Title=Features+-+People+%26+Lifestyle&Topic=0 (Registration required) 36. Ibid.

37. ‘Delhi Gay Murders Tip of Sleazeberg’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 18 August 2004. Also see Swapan Dasgupta, ‘The Problem is not Homosexuality’,
Rediff.com
, 23 August 2004.

http://us.rediff.com/news/2004/aug/23swadas.htm

210
Gay

Bombay

38. Vikram Doctor, ‘Less Than Gay’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 24 August 2002.

39. See—

(
a
) Suveen K. Sinha, ‘The Nowhere Men’,
Outlook
,
30 August 2004. http://www.

outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20040830&fname=Sex+%28F%29&sid=1

(
b
) Suveen K. Sinha and Shobita Dhar, ‘The Perfect Crime’,
Outlook
, 30 August 2004.

http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20040830&fname=Sex+%28F

%29&sid=2

(
c
) Dibyendu Ganguly, ‘ A Friend Remembers Pushkin Chandra’,
Times of India
(Delhi), 21 August 2004. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/822313.cms 40. ‘Horror Story of Unnatural Sex and Murder’,
Indian Express
(Bombay), 13 October 2004.

41. ‘Pop Goes the Myth’,
Sunday Mid-day
(Bombay), 28 July 1991.

42. Pinkie Virani, ‘Happy to Be This Way’,
Bombay
, July 1990.

43. ‘Bombay Dost Gets Company’,
Mid-day
(Bombay), 13 November 1993.

44. See—

(
a
) ‘A Center in Aid of Gays’,
Mid-day
(Bombay), 28 April 1994.

(
b
) Shabnam Minwalla, ‘Center to Help Gays Tackle Health Problems’,
Times of India
(Bombay), 17 March 1996.

(
c
) Saira Menezes, ‘Room With a View’,
Outlook
, 17 April 1996.

45. Ketan Narottam Tanna, ‘Elephantine Problems of the “Invisibles”’,
Hindustan Times
(New Delhi), 22 March 1996.

46. Shilpa Shet, ‘Helpline for Men’,
Mid-day
(Bombay), 1 June 1998.