Mihir R
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mihirxr.bsky.social
Mihir R
@mihirxr.bsky.social
67 followers 130 following 13 posts
socio-legal doctoral student
India/UK he/they
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mihirxr.bsky.social
Veronica might have been too shy to talk, but she overcame that limitation through her circulation of nonverbal signs. Veronica was a fan of the music of Milan Singh, a female who performed in the male persona of "Milan." Veronica brought one of Singh's cassettes to Sakhi and showed it to Cath: "Cath just showed it to Giti [Thadani]. Giti looked at the cassette, looked at Cath and said [about Milan], 'Definitely 1oo percent dyke.' It was the first time I had heard this 'dyke.' I didn't know what it meant. I asked Betu, and she didn't want to tell me." Veronica's "sizing up" by educated authorities would rely on the successful recognition of signs. The first in this case (and many others) was the haircut-a ubiquitous sign that is taken to have a symbolic, but also indexi-cal, relationship to lesbian desire. There was also trafficking in an iconic sign: Even after being sized up and brought into a lesbian community, Veronica still could not speak of her lesbian desire. But to signal her recognition of the terms of that sphere, she presented the authorities with a photograph of Milan Singh-a photograph that not only bore a resemblance to Veronica, but that further linked her to the image through her affective identification with it. The authorities did not have to point to Veronica and say, "Hey, dyke!" Instead, they "dyked" the image— an iconic sign that could now serve as the premise linking Veronica to the logical conclusion of herself ("This is a dyke. I am like this. I am a dyke.").
March 12, 2025 at 11:12 AM
mihirxr.bsky.social
Queer icons as a term has become somewhat monopolised by gay men, and for Western personalities. But the icon is everywhere!

Thinking of Milan Singh as queer icon in this excerpt from Naisargi Dave’s Queer Activism in India.
March 12, 2025 at 11:12 AM
mihirxr.bsky.social
The “first gay film from India”, BomGay, is an amazing treasure: irreverent and incisive. It is based on poems by R Raj Rao .

Watch it on YouTube! youtu.be/6HX6X3d7mLM?fe…
A blue decorated book cover titled “BomGay” by R Raj Rao with an Aark Arts logo LEFTY In the Fort campus library readers stare at you for writing with your left hand. You want to tell them you don't get it right when you write with your right, nor are you what is known as ambidextrous. But you keep shut. Speaking isn't allowed inside the library, though looking is, there are no laws against looking a family member used to say. But there are signboards saying 'Silence' all around. You wish the Fort campus library had mirrors for walls like Kyani's or Bastani's where you have fried eggs with your lover, great levelling mirrors that right all wrongs and achieve a degree of justice even the Bombay High Court cannot. ENEMA Constipation is an occupational hazard. The junk foods you swallow weekdays at Nariman Point, the sewage water you drink, even the exhausting fumes you breathe as monkey-gods fart, either induce diarrhoea or its binary opposite. In the glamour rooms of your apartment you strain so hard your belly could burst open. The neon signs advertise purgatives. Purgatives are purgatory they almost make you believe. Your elixir is an enema administered nightly in bed, no, not by a doctor and not with the tube. Next morning the bowels loosen and you are redeemed by noisy shit-jets.
March 9, 2025 at 10:27 PM
mihirxr.bsky.social
In Nov 2024, the Kerala HC explicitly ordered the Govt to provide reservations for transgender persons - a vital precedent.

Vibha and I had argued (papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....) that HCs had failed to appreciate that NALSA was an important doctrinal shift on reservations.
Yet, the Government failed to evolve policies providing reservations to transgenders. [...] While ordinarily this Court may not interfere in the policy domain of the Government, in cases involving fundamental rights and a clear direction from the Apex Court existing, the judicial role in enforcing such rights become imperative. The continued inaction by the Government, despite clear legal and constitutional obligations, leaves this Court with little choice but to consider issuing appropriate directions to ensure compliance with the constitutional and legal mandate. But in this case, the rights of transgenders have been declared by the Apex Court in the National Legal Services Authority’s case (supra), declaring the law as follows: Historically, the right to reservations in higher education and employment has been seen in the same framework of conditional social rights - individuals can demand the implementation of reservation policies after they are initiated by the State, but their right exists only insofar as the policy does. In fact, Courts often went further in enforcing a high standard of data to satisfy the constitutional requirements for reservation policies. This limited conception was disavowed in the NALSA judgment, which affirmed a systemic set of rights of transgender persons, and explicitly directed the state to ‘extend all kinds of reservation in cases of admission in educational institutions and for public appointments’.32 These rights were not contingent upon State action - instead, they necessitated State action to realise and protect them. Governments did not have the option to frame a policy and justify it; it was ordered to do so and no further justification was necessary. Given this radical upheaval, it is unfortunate that the judicial approach to petitions demanding reservations post-NALSA has reverted to the conditional social rights approach. In 2 cases, the final orders refrained from directing reservations, leaving it completely up to the discretion of the state governments to do so. In 2 more, the High Courts provide minimal direction to the state governments, leaving the prerogative of the manner and quantity of reservations to the executive. In 3 others, judgements reiterate NALSA with a clear direction for reservations but fail to enforce it in their directions. Even in Sangama, which is the only case that resulted in a positive outcome till date, involved the Court directing the government to consider representations and a proactive government. A key difference is the Court kept the case open and monitored it.
February 21, 2025 at 10:01 AM
mihirxr.bsky.social
Happy to receive news that my masters dissertation was awarded a 90, and that I have received 2 prizes for my LLM @kingscollegelondon.bsky.social
The Dickson Poon School of Law King’s College London Dear Mihir Rajamane I am writing on behalf of the Law School to congratulate you on your award of The best student on the LLM in Transnational Law and The best dissertation/writing project on the LLM in Transnational Law in the recent examinations.
December 2, 2024 at 12:11 PM
mihirxr.bsky.social
This just continues to highlight the importance of scholarship on constitutional conventions in India...
The government cleared the names with lightning speed, in less than seven days. “Informal meetings between the minister and chief were regular,” the 2nd judge told me. “Before any names were considered for elevation, Chandrachud would obtain pre-approval. What message would this send to the executive? You have spoiled their habit! They now expect the collegium to seek pre-approval, as some sort of a norm.” A former high-court chief justice told me that high courts are now reaching out to Supreme Court judges to ask them about the “safest names. There is an extraconstitutional body clearing names now." The two judges had told me they were worried about the cascading effect this pre-approval procedure would have. “I don’t know why Chandrachud does not stand up on appointments,” the 1st judge said. “This may have been the case earlier too, but not at this level! What about CJIs with a shorter tenure? Can he expect them to push back? What system is he leaving in place for the institution?"
November 15, 2024 at 10:36 PM
mihirxr.bsky.social
Excited to have started a DPhil at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies in Oxford!

I’m working on researching gender diversity and the law, and am always happy to get in touch with anyone in similar (or different!) fields.

law.ox.ac.uk/people/mihir-rajamane
October 30, 2024 at 5:05 PM