Partners, not wives: What lesbians Nick and Sayantika feel about being denied the right to marry

Nick and Sayantika, “the fully filmy lesbian couple”, have been in a relationship for four years nowThey live together as a couple, but for the lack of marriage laws, they are yet to be “legally married” As of today, there is no legal provision for same-sex couples to get married in India, despite homosexuality being decriminalised in 2018The story of how they came out to the world as lesbians and how they found each otherA private yacht in the Arabian Sea off the Gateway of India: How Nick proposed to Sayantika to be her “PIL” i.e. partner in life“Who we are is not just about how we are doing it in the bedroom”: Their thoughts on being objectified and discriminated against for being lesbianIn “Love, Marriage”, a heart-to-heart conversation with the “fully filmy lesbian couple” on the highs and lows of being openly queer in India Ep 1: Partners, not wives: How lesbians Nick and Sayantika feel about being denied the right to same-sex marriageIn this segment of “Love, Marriage”, a series of audio stories revolving around the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer (LGBTQ) community, and their fight for equality. The right to marriage, for example, is a right that is available to all citizens, but not if your partner is the same sex as you. In this podcast, we speak to Nick and Sayantika, the fully filmy lesbian couple by their own words, who will tell us all about their story, their struggles as an openly queer couple in India, their opinion on same-sex marriage, and what they feel about the Centre’s reluctance to legalise it. In part 1 of our conversation, Nick and Sayantika talked about their own stories of how they came out of the closet when they were younger. Sayantika recalls how she did not grow up with any representation of queer couples in her own life or in the media, and how that aggravated her confusions about her own identity and sexual orientation.Nick and Sayantika also talk about how they met and how initially they were each other’s nemeses. Their love story started from a conversation they had over tea, and four years later, they are in a relationship with each other, living in the same apartment, but are unable to marry for the lack of a legal provision for same-sex marriages. However, there has been a proposal. In a private yacht in the Arabian Sea overlooking the Gateway of India, Nick has proposed to Sayantika to be her ‘PIL’, that is, partner in life. “We are waiting for the legalisation to happen before we tie the knot,” they said.They also describe the various struggles of being a queer couple without the rights that the institution of marriage provides in India.108332542Ep 2: ‘Who we are is not just what we do in the bedroom’This is a segment of “Love, Marriage”, a series of audio stories on the LGBTQ community’s fight for equality. This is Part 2 of my conversation with one such couple from the community. Nick and Sayantika call themselves the fully filmy lesbian couple and if you hear their story of how they met and fell in love with each other, maybe you’d agree. In this podcast where Nick and Sayantika tell us about their opinions on what the Indian government thinks about legalising same sex marriage and why they feel depriving queer folks of a marriage law is inherently discriminatory. medium108332588Nick and Sayantika tell us about the various difficulties queer couples face for the lack of marriage rights. Things like opening a joint bank account, owning property together, inheriting each other’s assets are all privileges that are only accorded to heterosexual married couples and are inaccessible by same-sex couples. “We can't take a loan together. We can't buy insurance together as a family, right? We can't nominate each other in our insurance. There are so many things that as a straight couple people get to take for granted post-marriage,” Sayantika said.According to her, even though it has been 75 years since Indian Independence, and five years since Section 377 was struck down, the only goal so far accomplished in favour of the LGBTQ community is that homosexuals are no longer criminals. “But we have not been given any rights whatsoever, post that,” she added.In response to the Centre’s reluctance to legalise same-sex marriage on the pretext of it being against Indian culture, they spoke about how historically, cruel traditions like sati and dowry were part of India culture once, but were legally banned with time. They wondered why, similarly, with modernisation, the concept of marriage in India is averse to such evolution, and why it cannot include LGBTQ folks in its fold.That was the second part of my conversation with Nick and Sayantika.Audio production: Anil Chauhan