Anindita Sengupta » rights http://aninditasengupta.com Poet, writer, columnist Tue, 03 Apr 2012 09:07:52 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Pictures of Bengaluru Pride http://aninditasengupta.com/2008/06/pictures-of-bengaluru-pride/ http://aninditasengupta.com/2008/06/pictures-of-bengaluru-pride/#comments Mon, 30 Jun 2008 19:35:07 +0000 Anindita http://aninditasengupta.wordpress.com/?p=404 I’m not the kind of person who likes participating in marches. Most of the time, I’m not sure what difference they’ll make. But in a country where homosexuality is still illegal, the sheer visibility of the gay pride parade on Sunday made it something worth talking about. (It was Bangalore’s first gay pride parade.) And because sexual freedom is something I feel strongly about, I actually stirred myself (and A) post lunch and made it to JC Road where we joined the parade halfway.

Guesstimates of how many would turn up had ranged from 50 to 1000. The actual number was 500, which most of us agreed was not bad. This consisted of gays, lesbians, hijras, kothis and many straight people who wanted to express solidarity. The mood was an edgy mix of defiance and celebration; lots of colourful flags swished in the breeze; and while some faces were masked, others were joyfully bare. The media had turned up in droves and the police were surprisingly un-troublesome. Here are some snapshots…

poster faces1 faces6 faces7 people2 people4 people5 people1 people6 people7 people8 people9 march faces5 people3

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