• Rosanna Flamer-Caldera on the Time 100 and 25 years of LGBTQI activism 

Sri Lanka made global headlines a few weeks ago when Lankan LGBTQI rights activist Rosanna Flamer-Caldera was recognised as one of the 100 ‘Most Influential People’ by Time Magazine for her advocacy of equal rights for the local LGBTQI community. 

In a country which still criminalises same-sex relations, the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (or Questioning), and Intersex (LGBTQI) community still faces significant challenges. 

Other than the legal discrimination faced due to Articles 365 and 365A of the Penal Code, which date back to British colonial Ceylon, LGBTQI persons also face significant social discrimination. While the Supreme Court has ruled these laws unenforceable, they remain in place and a lack of anti-discrimination laws specifically protecting LGBTQI persons make seeking redress extremely difficult.

For 25 years, Flamer-Caldera has worked to balance the scales and achieve equal rights for LGBTQI persons. She played a pivotal role in founding the Women’s Support Group (WSG) in 1999 and Equal Ground in 2004, which is one of the largest queer rights organisations in Sri Lanka. 

She also became the first female Sri Lankan representative to the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Intersex Association (ILGA) and later its Co-Secretary General. Her advocacy led to a landmark victory at the United Nations in 2022, challenging Sri Lanka’s ban on same-sex intimacy between women, which was deemed a human rights violation.

The Sunday Morning Brunch recently sat down with Flamer-Caldera to talk about being recognised by Time and to discuss LGBTQI issues in Sri Lanka. 

Following are excerpts of the interview: 

What are your feelings on being recognised by Time as one of its Top 100 for 2024? How did it come about? 

To be honest, I’m not really sure how it came about. I was just as surprised as anyone. I got an email message from this writer and at first I thought it might be a scam, but then I googled her and she was a writer from Time. Once it sank in that it was real, I was just like ‘whoa, this is huge!’. 

You’ve been at the forefront of Sri Lankan LGBTQI rights advocacy for 25 years. Equal Ground celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. How did all this begin? 

I got into this in 1999 with a group of people (including my sister), founding the WSG. I was not looking at activism as a career at that point, since I had my own business in publication and event management. 

One of the women who founded the WSG was Sunila Abeysekera and her interest lay in the fact that LBTQ women didn’t have a space in Sri Lanka, and it was with her encouragement and support that we started WSG. 

At the time, there was just one organisation which was actually promoting rights of gay and bisexual men and trans women and it was looking at it through the health aspect of HIV and AIDS prevention. There was no organisation working on the well-being of LGBTQI persons, and by well-being, I mean feeling proud of themselves, good about themselves, and knowing that there are others like themselves out there visibly being a part of society. In order to gain rights, we need to be visible. 

Without visibility, we cannot gain equal rights and so we started Equal Ground to do exactly that. When forming Equal Ground, my sister and others decided that we wanted to encourage the community to come out, be proud, and be counted, and it was something we realised we couldn’t do alone. 

We needed allies from every sphere of society, from media to law to healthcare to friends and family – particularly family. A lot of LGBTQI persons in Sri Lanka do not have the backing of their family in the same way that my sister and I did. We were lucky. We never had to fear that our parents would reject us, but that is not the same for many LGBTQI persons in the country. This is why allies are important and why Equal Ground avidly pursued creating allies as well – to create policies of inclusion, acceptance, and equality in all spheres. 

You lived abroad for part of your adult life and had the opportunity to continue to live abroad. What made you decide to come back and make a difference in Sri Lanka? 

I’m Sri Lankan. I was born and raised here and missed my country. I lived in San Francisco for 15 years starting as a young adult, and to tell you the truth, when I returned to Sri Lanka from the US in my 30s, I was shocked that there was such a thing in the Penal Code that penalised LGBTQI persons. 

Yes, I could have stayed in San Francisco, but I missed Sri Lanka. I missed my family. My parents were still here and once I got involved with advocating for rights for queer persons, I got very entrenched in it. There was so much to do and I felt that no one was really doing it in a way that resonated with the non-LGBTQI community. 

And this goes back to Equal Ground’s approach of building allies and what I feel was the key to our success as an organisation – engaging with and cultivating acceptance among the non-LGBTQI community. By seeking to ally ourselves with the non-LGBTQI community, the message would be louder because it was not coming just from us but from straight people also. That was the key to helping us get to where we are right now. 

Over the years, Equal Ground has done a lot to build acceptance within the non-LGBTQI community, from sensitising programmes for family and friends to Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion (DEI) programmes within the corporate sector to sensitising programmes with Local Governments in over 20 districts. 

In 2022, you were instrumental in shaping a ruling made by a UN women’s rights committee that recognised that Sri Lanka’s existing laws on same-sex relations violated human rights. Tell us more about that experience.

Articles 365 and 365A are laws of Sri Lanka’s Penal Code (which was instituted by the British in 1883 when we were a colony) that talk about carnal intercourse which goes against the order of nature committed by one man with another man. Article 365A addresses acts of gross indecency committed by one man with another. This was definitely a sodomy law from the British. 

In 1995, Neelan Tiruchelvam put together a private member’s bill (much like the one put together by Premnath Dolawatte recently) to decriminalise or review these laws and take the criminal element out. The Justice Minister at the time reviewed the laws and decided it was gender-biased and removed the mentions of male, throwing everybody into the melting pot, which meant lesbian intimacy was also criminalised. 

The case I took to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) challenged the Government’s right to criminalise people with same-sex feelings, especially LBTQ women who are attracted to and have relationships with other women. 

CEDAW ruled in my favour and said that the Government was violating human rights by criminalising same-sex relationships. I filed this case in 2018 and the judgment took place in 2022. It’s a decision that has reverberated across the globe for the more than 40 countries which criminalise relationships between women. It has set a precedent that women in such countries can cite when discriminated against. 

You’ve driven change in Sri Lankan LGBTQI perceptions for 25 years. What is the biggest progress we have made?

I would say the biggest progress made is the second bill that came about to decriminalise same-sex relationships. I’m also most proud of the fact that people’s attitudes have changed quite a bit. We’re now much freer to advocate for LGBTQI rights and this has led to more queer rights organisations operating all over the country. 

Also, The attitudes of certain Government departments and even policies have changed. The Ministry of Women, Child Affairs, and Social Empowerment in its documentation recognises LBTQ women. I recently received a call from the Election Commission to discuss ways to help transgender persons go to the polls and vote without discrimination. 

I’ve been invited to speak to the Ceylon College of Physicians. Corporate Sri Lanka reaches out to us to have DEI sessions and sensitise employees to LGBTQI issues. HR policies within companies are changing to be more inclusive. This is all progress. These things were unheard of before.

What are the biggest challenges for LGBTQI persons? 

There are still many challenges that LGBTQI persons face and they vary depending on who you speak to. For me, my biggest challenge is trying to get the decriminalisation of same-sex relations sorted out. 

For others, their biggest challenge could be their parents and families accepting them, or finding a job where they’re not ridiculed or vilified for who they are. 

There are so many challenges that LGBTQI persons face. Yes, we have made progress and things have gotten better for many, but we still don’t enjoy the same rights as the heterosexual community.

What’s next for you? 

Decriminalising same-sex relations. The Time 100 listing, while very inspiring, doesn’t actually resonate with the Government. For them, it’s business as usual. I did get a few congratulatory messages from some politicians I have worked with over a long period of time, but our Government is what stands in the way of freedom for the LGBTQI community. 

Decriminalising same-sex relations is low-hanging fruit. It is easily done. Even the Supreme Court has ruled that it should be done. Why is it that the Government is so apathetic to giving rights to the LGBTQI community and voiding a 140-year-old law that came from someone else and not our own people? 

Those in Government need to do what is right and not what is good for their political careers. They have been voted in by the people and should be working on behalf of all the people in this country. No law or civil space should marginalise anyone based on the colour of their skin, their ethnic background, their religious belief, sexual orientation or gender identity, or their status in life. Nobody should be discriminated against by anybody, particularly by our Government, for being who they are.