Proud to be Out

While Miss India World, Navneet Kaur Dhillon, is endorsing popular brands and getting all the help she needs to represent India at an international pageant, Nolan Lewis had to run from pillar to post in search of sponsors and funds to get to Brussels as India’s representative at this year’s Mr Gay World pageant. Held in the Belgian capital between 31 July and 4 August, the competition featured contestants from 25 countries, most of whom were funded, coached and groomed as diligently as Dhillon.

We meet a day before Lewis is to leave for Brussels. He tells me that though Wendell Rodricks has agreed to design his traditional costume, no one else has offered any help. “I understand why they wouldn’t want to sponsor me for such an event. But most people I spoke to were very supportive and wished me well,” he says modestly.

Lewis is not India’s first representative at a gay pageant. In 2008, Zoltan Parag Bhaindarkar went to Los Angeles to participate in a contest. Later, the media reports stated that Bhaindarkar was “too scared to come home (due to threats)”. A source says he has since sought asylum in the United States and currently lives in New York. The following year, Bhavin Shivji Gala was India’s representative at Mr Gay World, but didn’t show up at the event. In 2011, Raul Patil contested but did not attend the finals.

Lewis is not flustered by the country’s chequered history at gay pageants. “Parag’s story is different,” Lewis tells me, “he was outed by the media. I am the first gay man to represent India and to publicly speak about it. That’s how I have changed Indian history. I am Mr Gay India. I want people to know about me. I want to make a change. I am not in it for the employment opportunities or the goodies, and if there are threats, I’d rather come back and face the music.” For Mr Gay Pakistan, Amir Rafique, Lewis’ best friend among the contestants, the risk is greater as in his country, homosexuality is considered an offence punishable by death and the cultural backlash could be severe. According to Lewis, when it was suggested to Rafique that his life might be at stake, he responded, “Jaan toh jaani hi hai.”

During the course of our conversation, Lewis assures me that most opponents of homosexuality are not hateful, just ill-informed. He points to the temples of Khajuraho as evidence that “India has a long tradition of homosexuality”, that Indian society is more accepting of men having sex with men than many countries in the West, though there remains a pressure to get married. He explains, “Most gay men in India marry women due to such societal pressures. So if not gay people, at least think about the women they are marrying. These men continue to have sex with men and many women end up contracting sexually transmitted diseases.” He too wants marriage, but on his terms. “I want to settle down some day and have the right to family, inheritance and to adopt children.”