There is celebration in the air. The Supreme Court of India has just finished its hearing on whether Section 377, an archaic Victorian-era law which criminalises sexual activities “against the order of nature”, should be done away with once and for all.

The queer community in India achieved a victory after decades of activism when the Delhi High Court, in a historic judgement on 2 July 2009, “read down” Section 377 thus legalising consensual homosexual activities between adults. Since then, there have been attempts to change the decision – but finally the hearing is over, and soon the decision is due.

I was in Calcutta, the city of my birth, the day homosexuality was legalised in 2009. I remember crying when I heard the news being flashed on television. Within moments of the decision, texts started getting sent around and an impromptu vigil was planned outside Nandan. For those unfamiliar with Calcutta’s cultural geography, Nandan is a government-sponsored film and cultural centre and remains to this day a popular cruising ground. By the time I arrived the place was heaving with people. There were colours flying all around and the media had gathered to document what was quite a spectacle.

I grew up in Calcutta under the shadow of Section 377 which effectively criminalised homosexuality and has been used almost exclusively against LGBTQ individuals who continue facing harassment and blackmail. Growing up as a queer teenager in the early 2000s I often heard harrowing tales from friends who had been beaten up by gangs when they went out cruising, or in some instances even taken to prison where police officers demanded a bribe before letting them off with a warning that they would tell their parents about their “immoral lifestyle”. Academics such as Ruth Vanita and Hoshang Merchant have rightly used the term “India’s shame culture” whilst referring to this. If one’s sexuality is made public it not only brings “shame” to the individual but also to their family and larger society. Read more via the Independent