I'm blessed to count Harish Iyer as one of my closest friends. Most of you know him for his unabashed and tireless campaign for gay rights. To many, he is the face of Gay Pride in Mumbai. Few know that he has a private mini army of female journalists pals who dote on him (and are secretly jealous of his dimples!) I'm one of his many 'Kalam wali Bai' buddies and love it when he wears our friendship on his sleeve, much like his heart.
When we are not busy handling each other's PR, we brainstorm about how to make the world more Gay-friendly. With the 2012 Mumbai Gay Pride Parade just round the corner, Harish and I realised, one of the biggest reasons homosexuality is still discussed in hushed tones by a majority of Indians, is because we think it is a part of Western culture. This is mainly because we don't have one decent word for gay in Hindi. 'Samlaingic' doesn't count as it sounds more like Sanskrit, a bit like the name for some incurable disease. Infact most Indians see homosexuality as some kind of disease and many a religious/spiritual guru has offerred a cure! Most common words used for gay people, like gud, mittha, dheela, fail to convey the meaning. Infact, these are just derogatory words that aim to emphasis how un-manly most gay men are. That got me thinking... What if we came up with one Hindi word that is not offensive, a word that conveys the essence of being gay in a fun and meaningful way, we might just be able to make the concept slightly more relatable. That's when I came up with Mast (like fun... bindaas)... It is nothing but the Hindi translation of the English word 'gay' and it fits!
Also look at the name of the parade... It is the Gay PRIDE Parade... Pride is what you call a group of Lions. The courageous leaps that the Gay community has taken over the last few years, should leave little doubt in anyone's mind, that this is a community of Lion Hearts! Not a herd... not a pack... but a pride...
So from now on, feel proud when you say Main Mast hoon... Sherdil hoon... Gay hoon!
