First it was slavery, then it was looting the world's architectural treasures and hauling them back to our museums. Now it is homophobia.
Over the years Britain has been asked to apologise for many historical wrongs but activists in India are about to demand another apology.
Sixty-six years after Mahatma Gandhi told the British to quit India from a park in Mumbai, thousands of gay activists will gather in the same park tomorrow to call on the British government to apologise for introducing anti-sodomy laws that still make homosexuality illegal in India today.
Their call will be issued during the first gay pride march in Mumbai for three years and is part of a wider campaign to abolish a Section 377 of the Indian penal code which outlaws "unnatural sexual offences" and theoretically punishes anal or oral sex with up to ten years in prison.
In practice no-one has been prosecuted under the law in the past two decades but it has been used by officials to counter the work of HIV activists in some Indian states.
Gay rights campaigners also argue that because Section 377 enshrines homophobia within India's legal systems it also legitimises the continued repression of gay men and women in wider Indian society.
A draft copy of the statement seen by The Independent accuses Britain of exporting homophobia during the nineteenth century when colonial administrators began enforcing Victorian laws and morals on their Indian subjects.
Here are a few excerpts from the statement:
"Sixty six years ago… Mahatma Gandhi gave the call for the British to Quit India. Today we invoke the Father of our Nation's spirit and call on the British government to apologise for the legacy of hatred they left us in the form of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code.
"Through this law the idea of treating homosexuals as criminals was imposed by the colonial government on the more tolerant traditions of India. We call on the British government to apologise for the immense suffering that has resulted from their imposition of Section 377. And we call on the Indian government to abandon this abhorrent alien legacy of the Raj that should have left our shores when the British did."
The demand will almost certainly be ignored by the British government who have yet to issue the long sought after apology over slavery – Blair came closest in 2006 when he expressed "deep sorrow" over Britain's involvement in the slave trade.
But the call goes to the heart of whether Britain should admit guilt in some of the less pleasant aspects of its colonial past.
The same British-inspired laws that make homosexuality illegal in India are still in place in former colonial countries like Jamaica, Malaysia and Nigeria. Britain may have abolished the majority of its discriminatory laws (anti-sodomy laws were repealed in 1967), but its homophobic legacy lives on in many of the countries it once occupied.
But what about prior to the British colonial administration of India?
Gay rights activists argue that before Britain turned up with its western moral values, India had a long history of tolerance towards same-sex relationships.
They point to historical evidence showing that in Hindu, Buddhist and even the early Muslim Mughal cultures, homosexuality was very much accepted (or at least ignored).
Sections of the Hindu scriptures, the Kama Sutra, the acceptance of a third sex (tritiya-prakriti), and the litany of erotic carvings at temples such as Khajuraho are just some of many indications that show how Hinduism has long accepted all sorts of forms of eroticism.
Early Mughal poetry (prior to the more austere reins of emperors such as Aurangzeb), meanwhile, often documents and praises the love between two men.
Many Indian activists believe that the imposition of the anti-sodomy laws in 1860 by the British was a major step-backwards for a culture that had otherwise tolerated the type of eroticism that was simply unacceptable to the Victorians.
Sachin Jain, Co-founder of Gaybombay, told me the other day: "This is more of my personal belief, but I think an apology from the British Government will bring a sense of closure to the hundreds of thousands of LGBT people in the Commonwealth, from Jamaica to Nigeria, from Pakistan to Sri Lanka, from Malaysia to India who personally have suffered murder, torture, blackmail, harassment and violence attributable (directly or indirectly) to anti-sodomy laws. All we are seeking is an apology, not help. We have faith in our democratic processes and values of the freedom movement to bring about change."
After years of independence? People in all of these countries have the responsibility to change their own laws, as people here succeeded in doing. To say "this law was imposed by our colonial masters", and expect them to apologise for it, without changing them oneself…? Independence is for making one's own changes. 21C Britain is not 19C Britain, and 21C India is not 19C India: apologies would be pointless.
Posted by: Doc M | Friday, 15 August 2008 at 10:36 PM
Must agree - it is quite within the competence of the Indian government to change the law. As other aspects of colonialism were rejected - why not this one?
Posted by: Mike Homfray | Friday, 15 August 2008 at 10:51 PM
India had an outbreak of hysteria ,not to mention rioting ,last year when Richard Gere and Shilpa Shetty had a bit of a snog.
Yet we are supposed to believe that Indians in general approve of buggery .
I don't think so.
Posted by: G Gardner | Friday, 15 August 2008 at 11:45 PM
Get stuffed, and that's from a gay man, I'm fed up with former colonies blaming us for something which happened before I was born, and had no control over.
Change your laws if you don't like them, don't blame me.
Posted by: Ian | Saturday, 16 August 2008 at 02:08 AM
I do think the Indian Gay community has gone over the top for asking the british govt to apologise ...but let that not be an excuse to bracket this 'whinge' into that category of all the wrongs by the colonial masters....this becomes apparent from the way Mr jerome Tayor has trivialised some of the other wrongs that have taken place in the past. teh first two paras are quite suggestive of that..
Slavery and the 'divide and rule' game played by the British are not the same as homophobia. Ian, some times it does take a long time to undo the damage done by colonial rulers...it is not like re-building home after a storm.
Posted by: ems | Saturday, 16 August 2008 at 03:28 PM
I absolutely agree. And while we're about it, how about getting the Catholioc Church to apologise for all the horrendous things it has done, including burning queers at the stake. At least an apology will make it clear that we never had the right to interfere in Indian culture in this way, and if we don't apologise it will mean that we still believe that we did.
Posted by: Oxymoron | Saturday, 16 August 2008 at 04:08 PM
Ian is, I think, getting a we bit paranoid here. After all, who's blaming him personally? The fact that he can't see the difference between blaming a government of the past and blaming him personally reveals his level of uptight defensiveness. When someone has done something wrong, sincere apologies clear the air. It doesn't matter when it occurred. OK, so slavery was worse, as was the genocide of aboriginal peoples all over the world. But this 'little thing' which Indian gays are raising is no less an example of the arrogance of colonialism,than anyyhing else . It shouldn't be allowed to rest until an apology has been issued.
Posted by: Oxymoron | Saturday, 16 August 2008 at 04:47 PM
NO apology! Not in my name.. this would send out the message that India is now a febrile and disparate community unable to mend the wrongs in its own legal system. It has to look to the superior Mother Country to learn tolerance and humanity. They must learn to stand on their own two feet, we cant keep bailing them out all the time, notwithstanding the contribution during WWII. Jolly good chaps during that bust-up, what?
Posted by: Ron | Sunday, 17 August 2008 at 12:32 PM
Should we also apologise for banning other Indian traditions such as suttee? India has been independent for 60 years and has had plenty of time to get rid of this colonial law - as the British parliament itself did in 1967. Don't suppose there's any chance of a thank you for the network of railways and other public works we left - not to mention of course the legal system itself?
Posted by: Joe | Sunday, 17 August 2008 at 05:06 PM
I though Suttee would get a mention. People just love abstract equations. The Indian gay community is fighting against something which the Brits were originally responsible for. I don't see anyone fighting to restore suttee. But people are fighting to repeal this law. An apology from those who first made the law would strengthen the hand of Indian gay people in their fight for their rights. What's so humiliating to ordinary Britons about that? It's governments we are talking about.
Posted by: Oxymoron | Sunday, 17 August 2008 at 06:26 PM
And while we're about it, we should apologise for the British reaction to the Indian mutiny. Hundreds or thousands, perhaps millions massacred over that. You talk about the railways and other public works. There's the utter barbarism of British Imperialism in India as well.
Posted by: Oxymoron | Sunday, 17 August 2008 at 06:30 PM
Look at the big picture Oxymoron. And brush up on your history - hundreds of thousands were not killed during and after the Mutiny and certainly not millions. Calm down! Anyway, when the Brits were being beastly to the Indian gay community in the 19th century all my ancestors were in Ireland, probably being oppressed by the Brits (well that's all we Brits are good for innit?) - don't worry I don't expect an apology. Though a bit of compo would be welcome.Maybe that's what they are really angling for?
Posted by: Joe | Sunday, 17 August 2008 at 08:50 PM
Ireland, of course, is another sad chapter in the history of British Imperialism - as is Scotland, where I happen to live. I have done some history on the Indian Mutiny and the figure does run into hundreds of thousands. And the methods of killing were abominable too. I refuse to listen to those who talk about the civilising influence of British Imperialism. Railways were built only to make it easier to rob people. But amends can be made, and apologies draw a line in the sand.
Posted by: Oxymoron | Monday, 18 August 2008 at 05:10 AM
Well I am an Indian and I am not sure whether what Indian gays are saying is right or not? But someone mentioned about the Railways and World War II. Let me tell you that India is quite a big country as compared to UK. It was strategical need for all your forefathers to connect India as it was divided into princely states. English needed railways for better governance and also to transport the wealth. It was built from the Indian revenue anyways. Also in the second world war and the first world war as well English only stayed a chance because of the Colonial Indian army fought for them. And till date there is no compo???? Infact you owe a lot to Indians who died for your country otherwise you would not have born into a free England but instead English would have been subjects of german occupation.
Thank you
Posted by: Taran Preet Singh | Monday, 18 August 2008 at 10:41 AM
Apologize.
I do see a potential downside in taking up more and more ministerial and parliamentary time in issuing a growing number of apologies, but perhaps then we could issue a 'blanket apology' covering all the out-moded and otherwise disgraceful behaviours of our forefathers. If your grandparents did something which you now would disapprove of, wouldn't you also apologize: "They know not what they did". Perhaps the democratic process forced them to say what their electors wanted to hear. In that case, we'd be apologizing for our own intolerant views. Either way, we should apologize.
Posted by: Stephen Lawrence | Thursday, 16 October 2008 at 07:40 PM
There is little tolerance for gays in Indian society. The law makes it worse. By asking Britain to apologize these people are trying to highlight the fact to the Indian public that it is the antiquated, discriminatory laws - a legacy of British rule - which make their live miserable. I don't they really expect Britain to apologize.
Posted by: Rajan Mehra | Sunday, 26 October 2008 at 03:50 PM
Do Indians have some secret desire to go back to colonial rule? I'm suprised they didn't swipe away all colonial laws at the beginning and start from scratch. That would seem like the best way to erase or at least reduce the legacy of colonial rule. It's odd that so many nations hold on to ideas that were introduced by colonial oppressors and somehow even think that you are un(insert nationality here) if you don't support the idea even though it came from somewhere else.
Indian should also legalize cannabis. Laws against cannabis are also a legacy of colonial rule. Traditionally it was an important religious herb.
Posted by: Satov | Tuesday, 28 April 2009 at 03:38 AM
Interesting post about Minority report: Gay Indians demand a British apology!!!
Have a nice day!
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