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Supriyo Chakraborty and Abhay Dang first linked up on the dating website in December 2012, and have been dating ever since.
Over the next five months, the two meet their families and are accepted by them, and they move in together. In 2021, they have a commitment ceremony to mark their ninth anniversary, with more than 100 friends and family – and their dogs – attending to celebrate their love.
“We always wanted to get married because, in India, marriage is the main step that you take, you know, to make your relationship official,” Dang told CBC News in an interview at the couple’s home in Hyderabad.
Chakraborty described the relationship as a “bouquet of different traditions” that brought together a “beautiful blend” of their heritage – Chakraborty is Bengali and Dang is Punjabi – with the exchange of vows and rings.
But no matter how much pride they take in uni, it’s just a ceremony in the eyes of the law. It does not grant the rights and privileges granted to opposite-sex married couples in India, such as making health care decisions for each other or obtaining joint health insurance.
The couple struggled to change. On Monday, India’s Supreme Court will begin hearing a collection of cases challenging the country’s ban on same-sex marriage.
If the court decides to legalize same-sex marriage, it will be an important moment for LGBTQ people in India and around the world.
The majority of 32 countries and territories have implemented marriage equality laws in America and Europe – and, when it comes to religion, especially Christians – so that positive results in India can influence laws elsewhere in the region.
Make a case
Chakraborty and Dang were one of two couples who initially asked the Supreme Court to change the law – the others were Parth Phiroze Mehrotra and Uday Raj Anand, a gay couple in New Delhi – but the number of petitioners has grown, and so has the Supreme Court. it has also transferred several cases from other high courts, including those in Delhi and Kerala.
sing the petitioner objected that the Indian Special Marriage Act, 1954 should allow same-sex couples to have the same legal rights as opposite-sex couples and that denying these rights violates several articles of the Indian constitution.
At Special Marriage Law perform a marriage outside the religion or belief of the spouses, as opposed to a union registered under laws relating to religious unions, such as the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955.
There is also the Foreign Marriage Act, which deals with marriages abroad where at least one partner is an Indian. (There are also petitions before the courts to change each of these acts to allow same-sex marriage.)
The way the Special Marriage Act is written assumes that the parties to the marriage are biological male and female and identify as such. It also refers to “husband” and “husband”.
“[It] should be read as ‘husband’ to include people regardless of sex or gender identity,” said Jayna Kothari, a senior lawyer who practices at the Supreme Court and is the founder of the Center for Indian Law & Policy Research. She also represented the three petitioners in one of the cases before the Court. Great
Courts in India have supported LGBTQ rights
The Indian government, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) since 2014, has refused to legalize same-sex marriage in the country of 1.4 billion people.
In a submission to the Supreme Court on Sunday, the Indian government said the court could not be asked to “change the entire legislative policy of the country which is based on religious and societal norms.”
But the LGBTQ community may have an ally on the Supreme Court. Previous court rulings on LGBTQ rights have helped pave the way to this day.
“Courts are not bound by public opinion,” said Sukhdeep Singh, founder and director of India’s online LGBTQ magazine Gaylaxy. “They have to abide by what the constitution says and … [the] Supreme Court in India especially has been taken [a] pro-people role in general.”
The most recent victory came in 2018, when the high court decriminalized same-sex sexual relations between consenting adults, ruling that a 156-year-old British colonial-era law was unconstitutional.
Kothari said the decision, while monumental, is just the beginning of eliminating discrimination against LGBTQ people and fully recognizing them as citizens. Marriage equality will be the next step.
“Decriminalization has absolutely no meaning unless positive rights are provided,” he said, explaining that it includes “the right to have a family, the right to own property, the right to adopt.”
CBC News spoke to members of the Indo-Canadian community to find out what the historic decision means.
Lack of the right to bring the brain drain
Political and social change has not happened fast enough for many LGBTQ Indians, who have chosen to resettle in more developed countries.
Saattvic, who goes by just one name, is an economist and former actor in the Indian film and theater industry. She said she was fed up with the “glacial pace” of LGBTQ rights improvements and moved to Vancouver in 2020, along with her partner, Gaurav Bhatti, who is from Canada.
He said there are many other LGBTQ people like him – who are educated, experienced and have the means to leave India – and not allowing same-sex marriage to contribute to the brain drain.
“These are the people who will wake up and leave if you don’t give them equal rights, and that has an impact on the economy as a whole,” he said.
Saattvic said India has paid the price for not advancing LGBTQ rights. He refers to 2014 World Bank case studytitled The Economic Cost of Homophobia, which estimates that India could sacrifice up to 1.7 percent of its GDP due to factors related to anti-LGBTQ discrimination.
Although Saattvic and Bhatti could get married in Canada, the couple wanted to have their wedding ceremony in India in front of their families.
Saattvic is involved in the fight for marriage equality, petitioning the Delhi High Court in 2021 to change the Special Marriage Act, in one case that has now been transferred to the Supreme Court.
She said she knows she is privileged to be able to find a better life outside of India, but she feels an obligation to help the majority of LGBTQ people in the country who do not have that option.
“This is for children living in villages… who have no way to express themselves. It is to give them a fair chance to lead a dignified life,” he said.
Saattvic moved to Canada with his partner because of the progress of LGBTQ rights in India, but he did not give up on legalizing same-sex marriage in his country. He explained why not allowing marriage equality could come at a cost to India.
Conservative pushback is expected
A court decision allowing same-sex marriage will not benefit everyone equally, said Singh, from Gaylaxy magazine.
“Even if the court decides, in a year or two, to legalize same-sex marriage, it won’t be hunky-dory,” he said. “I think that social change will take a long time to achieve or improve according to whatever the law says.”
Women, especially the poor, face different struggles in Indian society, Singh said, while men “are not gay or straight, they have a lot of opportunities.”
He said he also expects pushback from politicians and more conservative religious groups if the Supreme Court legalizes same-sex marriage. One prominent BJP MP, Sushil Kumar Modi (no relation to the prime minister), recently admitted that “same-sex marriage will cause complete disaster.”
But Singh said he believes the case will have positive implications and may affect legislation elsewhere in the region and around the world.
India, the world’s largest democracy and soon to be the most populous country on the planet, could become the second jurisdiction in all of Asia to legalize same-sex marriage, after Taiwan.
Chakraborty and Dang say the court battle has made a difference, raising awareness of the legal rights same-sex couples are denied. But he has his eyes on the winning result.
“When I die and when I think about my life … I think this will be my proudest moment,” Dang said. “If we can bring about change in the law, if we can bring about change in society.”
Chakraborty said she looks forward to the day her mother can introduce Dang as her son-in-law.
“Instead of, you know, my son’s friend.”
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