Book Talks@NLS Library | ‘Queer Judgements’ | With QAMRA and Queer Judgments Project

NLSIU’s Queer Archive for Memory Reflection and Activism (QAMRA) in collaboration with the Queer Judgements Project (QJP), are hosting a book discussion at the NLS Library on ‘Queer Judgements,’ an edited collection which was published by Counterpress in January 2025.

The book discussion will be moderated by Dr. Siddharth Narrain, Faculty Director, QAMRA Archival Project, NLSIU, with panellists:

• Vinay Chandran, Executive Director, Swabhava Trust
• Aishwarya Birla, Assistant Professor of Law, NLSIU
• Raju Behara, Researcher, Queer Judgements Project
• Deedee, Impact Consultant
• Radhika Chitkara, Assistant Professor of Law, NLSIU

QAMRA will also be displaying a small part of its collections for attendees to engage with at the NLS Library.

Registration is mandatory for visitors from outside the NLS community. You can register for the talk here.

Abstract

The Queer Judgments Project is an initiative that evolved from disparate conversations between the current co-editors about how legal judgments related to sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and sex characteristics could have been written in different terms in light of relevant legal frameworks. This project brings together friends, colleagues, scholars, and activists who are interested in improving and challenging the law and its application to make life better for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer and other minoritized people and communities.

This edited collection is the first output of the project and the pages of this book re-imagine, re-write and re-invent judgments, from queer and other complementing perspectives. With an international reach and multi-disciplinary scope, this edited collection invites you to a queer dance through 26 judgments and commentaries.

About QJP

The Queer Judgments Project is an initiative that evolved from disparate conversations between the current co-editors about how legal judgments related to sexual orientation, gender identity and expression and sex characteristics (SOGIESC) could have been written in more appropriate terms in light of the legal framework at the time. We wanted to cultivate a project that brought together friends, colleagues, and activists who were interested in improving and challenging the law and its application to make life better for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer and other (LGBTIQ+) people and communities.

The main aim of the project is to re-imagine, re-write, re-invent, from queer and other complementing perspectives, judgments that have considered SOGIESC issues.

The project has an international reach and multi-disciplinary scope. Thus, individual contributors are free to choose which judgment they want to focus on, featuring voices from across the globe. Similarly, the audience is to include people outside of academia, marginalised people and young people.

About the Speakers

Vinay Chandran

Vinay Chandran is the Executive Director of Swabhava Trust, a non-governmental organisation in Bengalurur. Established in 1999, Swabhava works on providing access to support services for LGBTQIA+ populations. Swabhava’s programmes include the Sahaya Telephone Helpline (080-22230959), documentation and research, training and workshops, and support spaces for various LGBTQIA+ groups. Vinay is a peer counsellor on the Helpline and set up the projects in Swabhava. His research on healthcare perspectives on SOGI communities has been published (co-edited by Arvind Narrain) in Nothing to Fix: Medicalisation of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SAGE/Yoda Press, 2015). He is currently working on a follow-up book on healthcare discrimination in southern India.

Aishwarya Birla

Aishwarya joined NLSIU in 2022 as an Academic Fellow, and now works as Assistant Professor of Law at NLSIU and Research Associate for the Pluralist Agreement and Constitutional Transformation (PACT) project. Her broad interests include human rights law, anti-discrimination, refugee law, and constitutional law.

Raju Behara

Raju is a non-binary disabled poet and expressive arts practitioner whose work centers queerness, disability, and anti-caste resistance through hybrid forms like blackout and found poetry. Their practice focuses on chronicling and re-imagining erased histories of queer-trans communities via community-led initiatives, including a trans-led expressive arts cohort with the Piravi Art Community. In 2022, they initiated Redefining Queerscapes, a movement using workshops to transform legal texts into protest poetry, archived in the Queer Judgments Project, Reframe Journal and multiple anthologies. Their debut collection, Withering Tempests (2021), explores queer isolation, and their writings on queer-trans journeys in urban spaces in India appears in journals and queer collectives. As an EQUAL fellow and a collaborator with the Asia Pacific Trans Network, Raju documented systemic healthcare barriers faced by trans youth and led Queer & Quarantine, a crisis-intervention initiative, during the pandemic.

Deedee

Deedee is an independent impact consultant supporting Trans- and Women-led organisations across India. Her work is grounded in feminist, anti-caste, and anti-colonial frameworks. She previously served as South Asia Co-Leader at Ashoka Young Changemakers, a Washington D.C.-based organisation known for pioneering the field of social entrepreneurship. An experienced organizer and fundraiser, she has mobilized over $1 million and trained 10,000+ students and educators on the relationship between Empathy and Power in everyday praxis. Deedee holds a Philosophy degree from the University of Delhi, where she also partnered with the Vice Chancellor’s office to advance inclusive student leadership.

Radhika Chitkara

Radhika is an Assistant Professor of Law at NLSIU, Bengaluru, where she is also pursuing her PhD on “Policing Terror: A Legal Cartography of Institutions, Powers and Functions” as Dr. NR Madhav Menon Doctoral Scholar and a grantee of the Law and Social Transformation Grant administered by DAAD-UGC. She is an Editor of the National Law School Journal, and has over twelve years of experience as a human rights scholar and practitioner. Her research interests include policing and civil liberties, gender, and indigenous peoples’ rights.