Rainbow Returns

The second edition of India’s biggest LGBT (Lesbian,Gay,Bisexual and Transgender) event,Kashish 2011— Mumbai International Queer Film Festival,opened on Wednesday evening. Launched last year as India’s first ever mainstream LGBT film festival,Kashish 2010 screened 109 queer films from around the world over four days. This time around,the organisers have upped the numbers with 123 films set to be screened at two locations in Mumbai,Cinemax Versova and Alliance Francaise,till May 29. Festival director Sridhar Rangayan said,“This year we have a huge collection of films and some stimulating panel discussions. We also have a bigger theatre and want everyone to return every day to watch great queer films.”

Support for the city’s queer community has been steadily increasing,and Kashish has gone the extra mile in supporting and promoting queer films and their filmmakers,using,as Rangayan puts it,“cinema as a means to understand what being queer means today”. Aside from screening films,Kashish has also organised discussions,interactions with filmmakers and a number of other cultural activities,all with the singular aim of increasing awareness about a community that has,for far too long,been in the shadow.

Present at the opening of Kashish 2011 were Sai Paranjype and Pooja Bhatt,who inaugurated the festival,Suhasini Mulay and Manavendra Singh Gohil,the country’s first openly gay royal,among others. After the ceremony was the screening of Undertow,a Peruvian film about a married fisherman who is having an affair with another man.