Queer Poetry Slam to be held during Delhi Queer Pride Parade 2014

It’s the day for colour and vibrancy in Delhi today, with the annual Delhi Queer Pride Parade. Held every year to celebrate the LGBT community in the capital, the parade goes from from Barakhamba Road-Tolstoy Marg to Jantar Mantar. But this time, it’s been preceded by some pre-parade events as part of a Queerious week.
Manish Sharma, an organizing member of the parade, told us, “Among the events is a poetry session – the Queer Poetry Slam – scheduled for November 29 (yesterday), a day prior to the parade, at a cultural cafe in Shahpur Jat.This is India’s first Queer Poetry Slam as part of the Queerious week hosted during the Delhi Queer Pride 2014. We have invited queer persons, straight allies and everybody else who queerly wants to talk poetry to come and share their stories with us.”
He told us that in the evening on the same day, there was to be a pre-parade party, ‘Together we stand’, at a hotel in Green Park, where parade participants were invited. Today, on the day of the parade, there will be a special screening of some interesting visuals that were clicked in the last few parades held in the capital. “They will be shown on a huge screen at the end of the parade, when everyone will assemble at Jantar Mantar,” said Manish.
Besides all this, participants will also take up the issue of the recent Bengaluru incident in which police allegedly arrested many transgenders on various charges and sent them to the Beggars Colony there.