Lord Clive would be spinning in his grave

A couple of weeks ago we hosted our first ever event at the Residence for the LGBTQ community in Chennai. It was a watershed event for us. It was – by diplomatic standards at least – daring, edgy and fun. It was the first time we’ve tried to engage with that community in a country where homosexuality remains illegal (in fact swype autocorrects to homozygous so I have, at least, learnt a new word).

My pride – pun intended – at both the quality of the event and the energy with which the team – Anita, Asha, Kumaresan and others -worked on it was tinged with a bit of shame that it’s taken so long to pull together. That’s my fault. This is genuinely something that I care about, but I’ve allowed other work priorities to push this work to the side. I recognise the challenges faced by brave activists. In Cameroon, as with much of Africa, and a country which in every other respect we adore, being gay was not just illegal, it was dangerous. Our friend and prominent LGBTQ activist, Eric Lembembe was murdered, and I will always remember the despair felt by so many at his funeral. The culprits remain at large.

Thankfully, the physical threat is considerably lower in India and it feels as if the situation is slowly improving. The courage and conviction shown by activists here to fight often lonely battles to carve out space for sexual minorities in the face of opposition from entrenched religious groups, traditional family structures, peer pressure and conservative Corporate India fills me with awe. So I’m so pleased that we were able to do our bit too show solidarity with them, and offer a safe space for them to meet.

With live music from A R Rahman’s Music Conservatory, and a DJ, they totally rocked the official Residence Cottingley with its East India silverware and crockery, and even got me on the dance floor which has always been one of my red lines since I became a Head of Mission given how embarrassingly bad I am – and that to with no YMCA which I know the moves to. It was easily the best party we’ve ever had.

The icing on the cake is that, as I said in my speech, I’m pretty sure that if long deceased colonial hands were befuddled by my succeeding hundreds of years of British Factors, Governors General and Residents in Chennai, I’m pretty sure they were spinning in their graves that night. That’s evidence of how much the UK has changed.

The real work starts now. We’ve started to listen to the community, and to try and understand the challenges that remain. The next stage is working out how we can help them to make their lives better. That’s a challenge, but it’s also the part of this job that excites me the most.

My speech is attached below.

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Bharat