(This is an essay from our December 2015 print quarterly, 'The Marriage Issue: Loves, Laws, Lusts'. See more from the issue here.)
Nepal is often presented as the leader in 'LGBT' rights activism in Southasia, if not in all of Asia. In September 2015, Director of Human Rights Campaign Global, Ty Cobb, lauded the protections extended to sexual and gender minorities in Nepal's new constitution, despite the criticisms made by many feminists and organisations within Nepal. He wrote:
This is a momentous step forward for LGBT equality in Nepal. The nation's leadership has affirmed that its LGBT citizens deserve the constitutional right to live their lives free from discrimination and fear… We congratulate LGBT Nepalis and their allies for this historic victory, and hope to see other nations across Asia and the globe take similar steps to ensure full legal equality for their LGBT citizens.
Undeniably, Nepal does have some of the most progressive legislative support regarding sexual orientation and gender identity. For instance, Basu Dev Bajgai, member of an expert committee formed to study same-sex marriage in Nepal, announced in 2015 that the committee's report "recommends legalisation of same-sex marriage and amendments of related marriage laws such as property rights, divorce and adoption." The recommendation, if adopted, potentially paves the way for marriage-equality legislation and reform, roughly eight years after a 2007 Supreme Court ruling created a strong legal mandate for advocacy and reform by comprehensively recognising LGBT rights. These are but two of the most recent developments that represent the tail end of a longer series of progressive reforms in Nepal related to sexual orientation and gender identity. Many of the reforms have focussed on the institutionalisation and state recognition of a 'third gender' in census surveys, on citizenship documents, and most recently, on passports.