Philippine Resto above, sorry to say, but your message is just about the dumbest on the subject. This is not about the male dominated Indian society at all, but about outdated laws and perceptions, which exist everywhere, including the US.

To recall, both the girls who were close friends, had left home on January 25 to attend their friend’s wedding at Lucknow. After this, they went missing. Their parents tried their best to trace the girls, but failed. Residents of Dhoomanganj area, the parents of these girls were suspicious of their ‘intimate’ relationship.

Shilpi was already engaged to a man. Till then, there was no sign that the girls were planning to elope. Their friendÂ’s wedding at Lucknow probably gave them the idea of running away together. They reportedly persuaded their family members to allow them to attend the wedding and left for Lucknow in a Tata Sumo. Their parents even reportedly came to the taxi stand to see them off. Later, ShilpiÂ’s father lodged a report at the Dhoomanganj police station that her daughter had been kidnapped. The cops, after failing in their attempts to trace the girls, took recourse to electronic surveillance.

The police came to know that Usha had called from a PCO in Sitalwad, Gujarat. A police team left for Sitalwad along with women constables and nabbed the girls.

According to sources, the girls created quite a scene and Shilpi shouted that nobody would be able to separate them. She said Usha was her husband and she would not be able to live without her.

When the girls were brought to the police station on Sunday night, they were not ready to be separated even for a while. Both said they shared a deep love and would not stay separately under any circumstances.

Grant sufficient time: Court

THE TWO girls, Usha Yadav and Shilpi Gupta, were produced by the police before the court, on Tuesday.

Judicial Magistrate AK Dubey said if the police wanted to record the statements of the girls, then they be produced on April 25. The court observed that sufficient time should be granted for independent thinking. One Rajendra Prasad Gupta of Dhoomanganj locality of Allahabad had lodged an FIR under Section 363 and 366 of the IPC. Father of Shilpi Gupta, Rajendra, had made a complaint against Usha Yadav for kidnapping his daughter.

In its application before the court, the police said that both the girls were adults and wanted to live together with free will, therefore, their statements be recorded.

The court directed that the girls be produced on April 25 and in the meantime they would stay at Nari Niketan.

The court also said that it was necessary to determine whether the girls were adults or not.

The court also said that no guardian of the girl has submitted any application for their release of the girls.

HIV/AIDS outreach workers who target men who have sex with men3 suffer widespread and serious abuses. The taboo in Indian society against men who have sex with men and the denial at all levels of their existence create an environment of moralistic judgmentalism against which AIDS educators battle constantly. The criminalization of homosexual practices under the pre-colonial section 377 of the Indian Penal Code on “unnatural offences” contributes to the impunity with which police harass these men and those who work with them. Organizations that conduct AIDS education activities in Lucknow, Mumbai, Chennai, Sangli, Bangalore, and New Delhi described serious incidents of police abuse that had sometimes prevented them from providing information and condoms to men who have sex with men. Common to all these accounts was the practice of police extortion of money or sex directed against a group of persons who are so marginalized in society that they have nowhere to turn for redress.

An important case of harassment of outreach workers in the MSM community involved the arrest of HIV/AIDS workers from Bharosa Trust and Naz Foundation International (NFI) in Lucknow in 2001. The police at first accused both groups of running a “sex racket” and of showing pornographic films in their offices, though eventually these allegations were dropped from the official charges. In this case, workers were detained for forty-seven days, part of that time without access to potable water, clean food, or sanitation facilities. The Lucknow case is still pending in the courts.

Advocates for men who have sex with men reported that the police regularly use section 377 to justify their ill treatment of HIV/AIDS outreach workers but rarely bring up formal charges under that provision. As a result, they say, the government can claim that section 377 is a benign and rarely used law. Police also accuse those doing AIDS outreach of promoting homosexuality, another kind of threat related to section 377, and have at times attempted to link them to national security offenses, narcotics offenses, or other criminal acts.

Men who have sex with men and women in prostitution are easy targets for police extortion and physical abuse. Discriminatory police practices that keep them from filing complaints or seeking redress, combined with the financial difficulties of making bail, typically mean long periods in detention facilities where they are subject to further abuse. Moreover, crackdowns on particular nongovernmental organizations engaged in HIV prevention and awareness among high-risk persons has had a chilling effect on the activities of others seeking to assist these vulnerable populations. In the case of the jailing of the NFI and Bharosa workers in Lucknow, for instance, several groups working with men who have sex with men reported that attendance at support group meetings dropped and vulnerable men were harder to reach for AIDS prevention work as word of the Lucknow incident spread and many men feared similar abuse.

In addition to arrest and detention justified by section 377, AIDS outreach workers have also been accused by police of being “threats to national security” and in one case charged under the National Security Act of 1980. The Lucknow defendants were publicly accused of spreading ideas said to be “against Indian culture” and charged with promoting homosexuality under various parts of the Indian Penal Code that have to do with abetting crimes.

Technically its not illegal in India to be gay, it is illegal to engage in gay sex. Nine U.S. states had this same law until 2003.

And most U.S. states still outlaw adultery (!!) What…have lawmakers never watched Desperate Housewives? I’m not sure but apparently adultery is very common?!

So America isn’t all that open-minded either.

I’m not too sure about this, but I think the Indian sodomy law, like its erstwhile American counterparts, and like American adultery law, is one of those laws that isn’t really enforced. The Delhi Court dismissed the case on standing grounds, meaning that basically a gay person who had been prosecuted would have to bring suit, not an NGO (lets see what the Supreme Court says). Can’t hate on the courts for that one, standing is a legitimate legal principle. If the Indian “unnatural acts” laws really are rarely enforced, don’t expect the courts to be able to deal with the issue anytime soon. Blame it on the politicians.

Homosexuality to be openly accepted in India will take some time. Though things are far from ideal.Meanwhile millions of Indian homosexuals(I am not saying all of them) live quite happily. I say this from gay friends of mine in India.

The difference is, homosexuality like sexuality in general is more under wraps. People dont express their sexual preferences – gay or straight in the open.

By fast tracking change you will only invite extremism from the other side, give a stick for VHP,Bajrang Dal, Muslim Board etc etc fanatics to beat you with(or rather INdian gays, not you) and make progress more difficult. Given its own time, things will be alright- afterall Indians are quite liberal when it comes to sex, just that its kept behind doors.