Latest Stories

Gay spas in Delhi are a sanctuary for many men, offering rare spaces for them to find desire and kinship.

The liberation of disabled men doesn’t lie in trying to fit into normative standards, rather, they must embrace their otherness.

Gym infrastructure and its culture reinforce rigid gender norms, forcing trans men to restrict themselves from fully owning this space.

From buzz cuts to bleach and blue hair, queer people in India negotiate gender, caste & religion strand by strand.

Queer-only sports groups provide affirming spaces for folks to reconnect with the field, and stay active and socialise.

After years of struggling to access gender-affirming healthcare, Ayesha found refuge in the Mitr clinic initiative only to lose it when funding was halted.

When you’re queer but people don’t know it, they tell you the worst queerphobic jokes. ​​

The quest for acceptance and professional success is driving some Hijra persons to fairness treatments that are unregulated and can be risky.

The queer family chronicles

In desi porn as in real life, caste often determines which bodies are considered sexy and worthy of pride.

Pratyusha and Anushree show what it takes to build a relationship in the face of everyday mental and physical health challenges.

Cliques reveal our desperate need for belonging while exposing the cost of gatekeeping.

The Indian education system is far from queer friendly. Can the efforts of individual queer teachers counteract systemic oppression?

What can exploring India’s queer kink scene reveal about the journey toward sex-positive inclusivity?

Queer trauma in India is systemic, but healing often begins in the oddest places of feeling seen—one compassionate witness at a time.

Equating masculinity with toxicity is a dangerous, transphobic attitude that leads us away from collective liberation.

We conducted 32 in-depth interviews with queer people across the country to find out which political parties they voted for and why.

Mainstream narratives of the trans and gender-diverse people tend to focus on resilience in the face of hardship. It is time to move past this one-dimensional narrative and ask why the hardships never seem to go away

In the hustle and bustle of a busy North Delhi neighborhood, a trans woman asserts her identity while grappling with the precarity of life and livelihood.

Equality of all is one of the founding principles of Sikhism. In practice though, patriarchy and heteronormativity reign supreme.

Many transgender people in India face discrimination in accessing livelihoods. Yet, those from marginalised castes are more likely to end up begging for a living.

When Indian gynecological healthcare fails to see beyond the gender binaries, where do the neurodivergent queer bodies find care? Where does the rainbow rise?

Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act is being misused by families to control the identity of their child who might be queer and to threaten queer organisations who step in to support the minor.

Trans and nonbinary people cannot access abortion safely in India. Now, the growing anti-choice movement is making matters worse for everyone.

When you’re neither ‘Dalit enough’ nor ‘queer enough’, which place do you call home?

Queer love is often forbidden in small town India. Two women, separated by caste, class, and religion, dared to defy the order.

Large companies roll out DEI hiring drives for transgender persons. But sustainable employment hardly follows.

The enforcement of binary ideas of transitioning in the Indian medical system deprives nonbinary folks of life saving and gender affirming medical care.

Transitioning from one gender to another requires grappling with a whole new set of absurd social norms.

Taking up space is a radical act of liberation for fat people, who face systemic discrimination wherever they go, including queer spaces.

A multilingual anthology by The Chinky Homo Project and Mariwala Health Initiative captures nuanced and revealing narratives of what it means to grow up and live as an LGBTQIA+ person in Northeast India

Patchy implementation of laws, lack of awareness, and stigma leave genderqueer Indians vulnerable to violence in their battle to fulfil a basic human need.

Desi lesbian and ‘transgender’ porn transgress societal norms of gender and sexuality, but fail to challenge the heteronormative ideals of family and marriage.

The becoming assertion of trans persons loving each other

Understanding the critical role of friendship through the lens of queerness.

Stigma and ignorance about the diversity of LGBTQIA+ communities in the Indian medical system continue to exact a hefty toll on LGBTQIA+ folks.

Authenticity and affirmation lie at the heart of desi gay porn’s continuing popularity. But will the hunks make the cut?

The BJP has sought to use tokenistic patronage of the LGBTQIA+ communities to create new Hindutva allies.

The unspoken experiences of queer disabled folx accessing medical care in India

What access intimacy is and how some therapists are incorporating it in their practice to make it inclusive of queer and disabled people.

Muskan was stifled by her biological family. Her chosen families, despite their transience, helped her grow

Not all queerness is loud. Quiet queerness has always been here.

A Dalit-Queer critique of Lihaf recovers a world of meaning lost in its translation, reminding us that desirability is shaped by caste.

Systemic discrimination deprives trans people of education and employment. Horizontal reservation promises a foot in the door.

Lack of support and inclusion within queer communities can drive some gay men seeking intimacy into rooms of drug-fuelled sex.

Six months, sobriety, and perseverance — the true story of my transformation, from flab to abs

On the Edge offers a fascinating window into the evolving literary representation of same-sex desire in India.

Doctor and writer Kinshuk Gupta on his debut collection of Hindi short stories about queer life in India and challenges of representing LGBTQ+ stories in Hindi publishing

The collapse of a deep Meitei–Kuki friendship shows how Manipur’s nascent queer movement is fraying, threatening its hard-won gains in the violence-torn Indian state.

Walking between the narrow bylanes of Old Delhi, Iqbal Ali leads queer heritage walks to revisit and rewrite the city’s heritage through a queer lens, and what Indian history owes queer persons.

How queer communities in India build and maintain their heritage through food

A novel exploration of consent, intimacy, love and acceptance in Shastri Akella's dazzling debut The Sea Elephants

Aromantic and asexual people are doubly invisible — both in the cishet and queer worlds.

Vaibhav Saria’s book Hijras, Lovers, Brothers, opens a crucial conversation about where hijras live under the LGBTQIA+ umbrella.

Through the lens of three Muslim-American children, When We Were Sisters sits the poignant intersection of grief, South Asian queer identity, and growing up too soon

Driven away by anti-homosexual stigma, some queer Indian Christians are slowly returning to the fold – helped by some churches’ efforts to make safe spaces for them

Indian parents and community libraries are turning to queer literature for children to help them be sensitive to varied sexual and gender identities

The award-winning director of critically-acclaimed films like “I Am” rejects the cisgender-heteronormative gaze and advocates for queer narratives told by queer people themselves.

In cities like Lucknow and Varanasi, multiple barriers prevent queer women from accessing safe mental healthcare. Some of them turn to their community for comfort.

With limited support structures, India’s LGBTQIA+ community has to work harder to plan for ageing and infirmity.

Transgender persons in India constantly negotiate their identities with the spaces they grow up in, live in, or move through in search of a home within and outside.