Blood not needed if you’re gay: The stigma attached to Mumbai blood banks

Both the donor questionnaire and health check-up are administered to every prospective donor

Health | Despite a landmark verdict on Section 377 by the Supreme Court, which decriminalised gay sex in the country, the Maharashtra arm of National Blood Transfusion Council (NBTC) recently issued a newly-updated blood donor screening questionnaire to Mumbai-based blood banks. The new questionnaire, designed on the lines of developed nations, will now mandate the blood collectors to ask the male donors about their sexual behaviour and whether they have multiple partners or engaged in the male-to-male sexual activity. For decades, the ban on homosexuals to donate blood exists in India and those who are at high risk of suffering from prolonged diseases such as cancer, allergies, respiratory ailments and organ failure are also not allowed to donate blood.

For the first time after the apex court judgment, a government-body has chalked out a clear ban on homosexual men and women donating blood. According to blood banks, earlier questionnaires asked donors whether they have any reason to believe that they might have been infected by HIV, hepatitis, malaria or other illness.| Section 377

NBTC’s 2017 revised guidelines, on the selection of blood donors reiterate that transgenders, bisexual men and female sex workers can never donate blood as they have a higher risk of contracting HIV and Hepatitis B and C.

Both the donor questionnaire and health check-up are administered to every prospective donor to enable a quick history taking, physical examination and blood test.

Dr Shobhini Rajan, in charge of blood safety at National Blood Transfusion Council, told The Times of India, “The new questionnaire aims to reinforce pre-donation screening as blood units are subjected to tests only after collection. The donors cannot be at high risk of contracting infections and donate blood.”

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Section 377 read down: When lovers of liberty rose to the occasion

Five years later, 6.9.2018 would go down as the high-water mark, of one modern India’s most well-documented struggles

BS | It took a woman Judge, Indu Malhotra to get the Supreme Court to ‘man-up’ and apologise for allowing Section 377 to stay on the statute books. An apology was long overdue. The Court’s previous ruling in Koushal v Naz (2013) had upheld the constitutionality of the provision. That Judgment was an abomination – both for its effect on the lives of citizens and its (spectacular lack of) legal reasoning. It turned the clock back on more than four years of equal citizenship that had been confirmed by the Delhi High Court. More significantly, it seemed to be the end of the road for almost three decades of progress made by the LGBT movement in India. Five years later, 6.9.2018 would go down as the high water mark, of one modern India’s most well-documented struggles.

Historical Origins

Section 377 is based on an archaic conception of sexual relations. It was introduced as an anti-sodomy law in India by the British crown through Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. With time the original Sexual Offences Act of 1967 decriminalised the acts of homosexuality and sodomy between two consenting adults in England but Section 377 persisted. The provision reads:

377. Unnatural offences: Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.

LGBT Movement in India

There comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. There comes a time, when people get tired of being plunged across the abyss of humiliation, where they experience the bleakness of nagging despair. (Martin Luther King Jr, 1955)

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History owes apology to LGBT persons for discrimination: Key points SC made

A five-judge constitution bench concurred on the matter and presented their opinion with various philosophical and constitutional rationale

BS | The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, decriminalising homosexual relationships between consenting adults. The judgement is being held as historic by the civil society as the apex court has for the first time ruled in favour of same-sex relationships.

A five-judge constitution bench concurred on the matter and presented their opinion with various philosophical and constitutional rationale.

Key takeaways of the historic verdict: Section 377

History owes an apology to LGBT persons for ostracisation, discrimination, the Supreme Court of India said

LGBT community possesses the same human and fundamental rights as other citizens
Sexual orientation a biological phenomenon, any discrimination on this grounds is

violative of fundamental rights So far as a consensual unnatural sexual act in private is concerned, it is neither harmful nor contagious to society

Courts must protect the dignity of an individual as the right to live with dignity is recognised as a fundamental right

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