The Delhi High Court's path-breaking ruling on 'Section 377' accepts sexual orientation as a clear criterion for classifying people. There are, however, stakes involved in this victory.
On 1 August 2009, in the aftermath of the Delhi High Court judgment on Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code that criminalises 'unnatural sex', a public-interest litigation (PIL) case was filed in the city of Ajmer demanding a separate living space away from the city for homosexuals. The petitioners, Subash Bhadoria and Shivdutt Parashar, are asking for a separate colony based on their belief that same-sex relations transmits diseases and corrupts the morals of youth. The first assumption in going about achieving such a separation would be, of course, that homosexuals can be identified and counted. One wonders what they would call this colony.
There is another side to this issue of 'identification' of sexuality, as well. As of February 2009, a group calling itself the Self Identified Gay Men's Association (SIGMA) has been working out of the premises of the Humsafar Trust, an AIDS-focused NGO in Vakola, Bombay. For the most part, SIGMA has organised events such as movie screenings, discussions and parties. An event poster on the Humsafar notice board caught the attention of this writer a few months back: "The admission for this event will be reserved only for Gay & Bisexual Men." In this, the SIGMA poster is making an assumption similar to that inherent in the Ajmer PIL: that it is possible to ascertain a person's sexuality. The difference is that, with SIGMA, the protocol for this checking is outlined. As this specific truth can be extracted from the individuals themselves, self-identification is treated as the ultimate marker of sexual identity. Then again, if the whole matter is framed as a truth, it can always be faked. One can claim anything at the door, so what exactly will the bouncer look for while giving or withholding access to a SIGMA party?
The idiom of the margin has always been capable of two meanings, functioning both as the threshold or the border. The margin, for instance, constitutes the threshold of access to government benefits, to societal acceptance, to acquiring basic human rights. In this sense, the dream of those who use the idea of the margin is that it should be an ever-receding line – like a hurdle sprint, the point is to always keep getting ahead of the self-appointed markers. It is for this very reason that the hurdle race is theoretically invincible; and so is the receding horizon of this political margin. The cultural anthropologist Gayle Rubin understood this brilliantly in her 1984 essay Thinking Sex, when talking about "the need to draw and maintain an imaginary line between good and bad sex … Arguments are then conducted over 'where to draw the line,' and to determine what other activities, if any, may be permitted to cross over into acceptability." It is a game that is destined to continue – always some cross, some wait to cross, and some are left behind.