As an atheist, I find it easy to get away with shocking ignorance on all matters related to religion. So when Shobhna Kumar informed me that Winnie Varghese, a lesbian Episcopal priest was in town, the first thing I wanted to know was how did she square it all out. As a progressive Christian, Varghese said, squaring it out in terms of theory was the easy bit. It was the practise - especially when she came across other priests of her communion - that was more challenging. In India for two weeks for a meeting between priests and lay persons of the diocese of Derby, the diocese of New York and the Church of North India, Varghese encountered different forms of homophobia. But initiating a dialogue that offers a separate version of religion, one which is tolerant towards the ignorant, and inclined towards the marginalised, is a first step, and an important one. I may not understand her god, but I do get her faith.

It was a cold and crisp Sunday morning, when I got a call from Mr Nagarkar informing me he had reached the airport and if I wanted, I could meet him there for an interview before he flew out of the city. And before I knew it, I was sitting across him at the domestic airport sipping on some machine tea, listening to a version of Mumbai, Indian history and individual agency that I've not had access to. Suddenly I was transported to the city where anything you want is possible - a Bombay of our imaginings that held me in such thrall when I'd hatch plans to escape from Delhi as a university student.

On November 23, the Bombay High Court ordered the BMC to seize horses that reside in unlicensed stables based on a  PIL filed by the Animal and Birds Charitable Trust that protested the cruelty of Victoria owners towards their horses.

Sridhar Rangayan is a filmmaker and one of the original members of the Humsafar Trust. With the help of a grant, Rangayan started this project called Project Bolo, an online database of oral histories, of LGBT activists. 

Last week, a mail dropped into my inbox which had some startling news. There are 37 lakh people in the country who're in various stages of forgetting who they are. In another 20 years, there'll be 70 lakh of them. Most of them will be above 60 years old. They'll begin by forgetting where they kept their spectacles. Then they'll put the tea cup in the freezer. And then, at some point, they'll just simply forget who the person sitting and talking to them, really is.

Last night, over a fodka tonic, I heard not for the last time the popular disbelieving refrain - 'But you're a journalist and you don't know about this?' One day, I will know how to answer that smartly. The news that I didn't know, and which had been circulating online since Tuesday, was about two women whose marriage had been recognised by a court in Gurgaon this week.
Beena and Savita, both residents of Khekada village in Baghpat, Haryana, went to a sessions court in Gurgaon to seek police protection.There, the judge Vimal Kumar made a note of their marriage and directed the police to offer protection, following the precedent of a Delhi High Court ruling "to ensure help and assistance to runaway couples."

And just like that, a lesbian marriage is legal in India.  

Either the law ministry can take suo moto cognisance of this and challenge the ruling (or, let's be hopeful, uphold it.) Or, someone could file a PIL challenging the verdict and the Delhi High Court could shoot it down (or, let's be hopeful, say that the additional sessions judge only makes a note of the women's statement about having an affidavit to prove their marriage and shoot down the PIL). Or the affidavit itself can be challenged and will be shot down, since an affidavit, bless that piece of paper, is the most legal form of writing that commoners like us have access to and can take umbrage under.

So. It all comes down to the the question - will someone challenge this. And then, comes another equally important one - are we prepared to defend Judge Kumar's ruling?

If gays and lesbians were allowed to wed and the revolution began in the dusty lanes of one of the most patriarchal states of our country, then that will be the best news we all would have heard in a long, long time. I know that much.    

So I noticed this interesting trend amongst those selling clothes nowadays - whether a small organisation selling tee shirts online, or a denim megabrand, apparel sellers are bringing apparel makers into the picture, either through working with farmers and weavers directly, or working with organisations like Shop for Change or farmers' cooperatives to source their fabric.
But the most interesting thing I found was from Pramod Dendawe, a farmer in Akola district of the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra - his farmers' group is selling the extra cotton they've grown to a weavers' cooperative in the neighbouring town. The shirts that will be made will be sold among villagers and townsfolk of Akola.

I met Chitra Palekar last week through a happy turn of events, and as the former theatre actor gave me a memorable interview, I began thinking that the premise of my story had to be made very clear. This wasn't a large section of parents I was talking about. The majority remain either silent - the best, as Chayanika Shah of Labia points out in the end of the article, that we can expect - or inflict mental and physical trauma on their LGBT children.
But here's a start. And a start is the most hopeful place to be in, isn't it?