Supriyo and Abhay, a gay couple fighting for the recognition of equal marriage in India

The story begins on December 20, 2021 in a garden in Hyderabad. We are in southern India, in this megalopolis which was built on the trade of pearls and diamonds but which over the decades has replaced precious stones with data centers. Hyderabad is a major center for tech industries. That day, Supriyo Chakraborty, a 31-year-old restaurant worker, and Abhay Dang, a 34-year-old computer engineer, said yes in front of all their family and friends. On their Instagram account, we see the two men in sherwani – the traditional outfit – with a necklace of flowers around their necks.

This marriage they wanted, those who met in 2012 via an app and who have never left each other since. They wanted to even if it was a marriage “for fake”, since Indian law only recognizes the union between a man and a woman.

This ceremony could have been a culmination, the proof that we can love each other in broad daylight when we are a gay couple in Indian society despite the weight of religion and traditions. On the contrary, it was a starting point. Because after their marriage, Supriyo and Abhay decide to go to court and ask for the same rights as those granted to heterosexual married couples. “We are everything for each other” they say to the journalists who come to meet them “while in the eyes of the law we are nobody.” They are the first to do this in India, but not the only ones. Other couples in other regions of the country are following their example and last November the Supreme Court accepted to study their request.

Indian government opposition

The government immediately announced its opposition. “The Indian concept of family unitysaid Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it is a husband, a wife and their children”. It should be remembered that we are starting from afar: in India, homosexuality was decriminalized only in 2018. The argument of the executive is obviously not enough for the Supreme Court, which this week took a big step forward: it announced the creation of a special jurisdiction to examine the issue. The first hearing will take place in a month and it will be broadcast live on television.

By exchanging their wedding rings in their garden in Hyderabad, Supriyo and Abhay have therefore transformed an act of love into a political act, opening up a major social debate in this country which will soon be the most populous in the world.