From Bhakti to Babur: Tracing India's Queer Legacy
The mythological perspective of India has considerably witnessed the queerness and henceforth, ancient India is much more prevalent in vindicating the presence of gender fluidity and various sexual expressions. Though the diversity in sexual orientations in ancient India isn't really much discussed, there exists literary and graphical evidence to prove the same in contemporary society. This article will dwell into the rich history of India which is inclusive of all gender identities and pro queer.
Around 7th century AD, India has seen a significant number of voices and advocacies for LGBTQ with the burgeoning of Bhakti movement as it opened up the concept of considering gods as part of the family, as lovers, friends and even child and this shaped a variety of sexual intimacies and developed fluid gendered structure. Famous poets like Tulsidas and Surdas wrote and sang romantic verses to the male lovers who were divine beings.
Surdas writes
“These eyes thirst for a vision of Hari (The god Krishna)
Wanting to see the lotus eyed one
Grieving for him day and night”
An illustration showing poet Surdas singing for the divine deity Lord Krishna.
Image Credits: Tribune India
The medieval period particularly during the reign of mughal dynasty had its own take on gender fluidity. Mubarak Shah, Allauddin Khilji's son and the third ruler of Khilji dynasty, was bisexual as he was in a sexual relationship with his partner Khusrao Shah who later became the Vazir of Mubarak. However, Mubarak was later killed by his beloved Khusrao due to a conspiracy.
Tracing back to the mughal period, while rulers like Aurangazeb were very religious and were against same sex relationships, on the contrary, through many ancient writings, it is found that the most of mughal rulers exhibited more acceptance towards diverse sexual orientations. Babur, the first Mughal emperor, wrote in his memoir, Baburnama, that he is attracted towards a boy named Baburi in Kabul. The founder of the mughal empire himself mentioned -
“May none be as I, humbled and wretched and love-sick;
No beloved as thou art to me, cruel and careless.”
An illustration of the sexual attraction between Babur and Baburi.
Image Credits: Daily Xtra
Following the lines of Bhakti movement, Sufism also attracted the non-muslims because of its ‘foregrounded personal devotion as opposed to the regimen of a dogma’. For instance, Sufi Saint Bulleh Shah exemplified pre-modern notions such as sexuality and religion through his writings on his love, Shah Inayat who was his murshid(mentor). In Persian poetry, the male-male love theme was recognized and broadly came into three categories a) poets who practiced ‘shahid bazi’ (Love of boys), b) poets who used the symbolism of male-male love but avoided gaining a reputation and c) poets who denounced ‘shahid-bazi’.
India’s history is rich enough in understanding homosexuality and gender fluidity. Many narratives underwent significant transformation with regard to sexuality and gender identities with the spread of colonialism in India. The British, in 1861, criminalized sexual activities “against the order of nature” which also includes all homosexual activities under section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. With this, modern India internalized the anti-queer perspectives and though there exists abundant information on our traditions and customs supporting the LGBTQ community, it all goes redundant because the contemporary society doesn’t really view the country’s history as it was. Yet again, the Supreme Court judgment to decriminalize homosexuality had become a new dawn to the queer community and stood as one of the primary modern lessons.
References
https://www.lawctopus.com/academike/history-of-homosexuality-in-india/
https://rupkatha.com/V3/n4/20_Queer_Sexuality_India.pdf
https://unacademy.com/content/karnataka-psc/study-material/history/qutbuddin-mubarak-shah.
By- Ishita Kisku & Nishita Sinha
Very informative article.
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