Lammy Award finalist Farhad J. Dadyburjor: “It’d be great to seek out more queer stories from our homeland”

'The Other Man' book cover; and author Farhad J. Dadyburjor. The Lambda Literary Award event is schedule for June 11, 2022.

Farhad J. Dadyburjor’s The Other Man (2021) is a finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards in the ‘Gay Romance’ category.

In the book, Ved Mehra – a “Punjabi George Clooney” – vice-president of Mehra Electronics, is facing difficulties coming out. His boyfriend of four years ditches him to marry a woman – perhaps due to family pressures. He offers to become Ved's ‘mistress’, suggesting that like many queer people, they can “continue like this”, but this doesn’t appeal to Ved.

Now, for the ‘happiness’ of his family, and under pressure from his mother Dolly, Ved too considers marrying the wonderful daughter of a business family, Disha Kapoor. Yet he wonders if he wants a “lifetime of misery” for himself.

He almost marries Disha. Then he meets an American on a business trip to India on Grindr – a dating (hooking up, actually) app – and everything changes in this story set around the time Section 377, which criminalised homosexuality, was about to be read down.

Moneycontrol interviewed Farhad via email ahead of the Lambda Literary Award announcement (due on June 11, 2022). Edited excerpts:

What does it feel like to be a Lambda Literary Award finalist?

The Lammy’s are the biggest celebration of LGBTQ literature from around the world. And it really is an honour to make it as a finalist in the ‘Gay Romance’ category, especially considering that this year the largest number of books were sent in – over 2,300. That said, I wish we could see this at our own major literature festivals and awards, with a category for LGBTQ literature. It would be such an impetus for writers and publishers to actively seek out more queer stories from our homeland.

For the most part, the novel is really predictable, yet thoroughly entertaining. And its characters are straight out of a Bollywood movie – filthy rich Indians who are unable to listen to their hearts because there’s a lot to lose. Tell us how this story came to you? What was the inspiration behind writing Ved’s dilemma?

One of the fun titles for the book was ‘Crazy Rich Gay Asians’ (riffing on a runaway success ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ by Kevin Kwan). And I’ve heard a lot of people draw comparisons with Bollywood, which is heartening and amusing since I don’t watch a lot of Bollywood movies. But that’s what happens once you finish writing a book – it becomes that of the readers, how they see it and how they view it, and you really don’t want to disturb that.

The genesis of The Other Man was really this wonderful heartwarming story between two men of completely different ages, ethnicities, and backgrounds united by one thing: love. And how each helps the other to understand themselves better and live their truest life. I felt it was important to give an international audience a ringside view of what it was like to be gay in India. Many of them would not know that same-sex relationships were criminalized in India until only four years ago, when the archaic Section 377 law was repealed on September 6, 2018, and this book holds as a celebration of the freedom to love who you choose. In fact, as it turned out, it was the first gay romcom set in Mumbai to be published internationally.

Ved, as a character, seems to have it all on the outside – rich, successful, good-looking…like the perfect GQ man. And we often look at people like this on magazine covers and think they lead such a great life, not realising what’s really going on internally for them. Ved, for all his stature and money, is miserable deep down inside from being a closeted gay man. It’s something that so many similar men in India face. And I wanted to bring about this dichotomy of the shiny surface appeal and how riven the person might be internally.

Ved’s conversations with Carlos initially while he is seeing Disha and is confused about whether to ‘come out’ seem like a sort of literary device that you employed to showcase that Ved is in two minds. Was that so?

While being a romcom, there were two important themes that I wanted to touch upon in this book. One was the hardship and importance of coming out. And the other issue is that arranged marriages are still a common practice and many times gay men acquiesce to an arranged marriage because they want to remain dutiful sons and keep the peace by not upsetting their parents. They always remain closeted. Through Ved, I wanted to highlight the fact how Indian men are so duty-bound to keep their parents happy that they put huge pressure on themselves to be the ‘perfect son’, even if it comes at a grave personal cost.

What do you think can be done to prevent this situation?

I personally have known and heard gay men marrying to keep their families happy, and in turn, ending up leading a life of misery. It’s an unfortunate reality that exists. In some cases, the son has even come out to his father before marriage but is told “don’t worry, now you’ll be normal”. The sad thing is that at the end of the day, no one is happy in such a situation – neither the wife, nor the husband, and neither the parents because they see their children being unhappy. It’s a no-win situation for everyone.

I really hope parents wake up to the fact that their kids may not be heterosexual like them, learn to respect that and have a dialogue with them about it. They need to be more aware and informed. And it’s great to see films like Badhaai Do and the web series The Fame Game highlighting this aspect, since movies, like literature, have the power to change minds.

If marriages are so central, do you think legalisation of same-sex marriages would have a real impact?

Definitely! If same-sex relationships are legalised, why not marriage. It only makes sense as the next step. Why should anyone not have the option to legally marry the person they love. That said, several gay couples who aren’t waiting around for this piece of paper are going ahead and enjoying a union with their loved ones irrespective.

But the representation of monogamous relationships in queer-themed books and movies takes up more space, neglecting other forms of companionships. Your thoughts?

There have been books on polyamory, but yes, far and few between. And not any from Indian authors, at least to my knowledge. The fact is, queer literature in India is still at a nascent stage, with just a small handful of books coming out each year. It also depends on what publishers are open to taking a chance on. So a lot of different factors go into this.

Though ‘coming out’ appears like a one-time thing in this novel, it’s really an everyday confrontation that goes beyond close-knit family, for society is inherently cis-het. Why do you think only queer people have to come out? What should change in society to make it more queer inclusive?

Yes, coming out is an ongoing process. I came out at 28, but I still feel like I am coming out once again with this book. Every time you meet someone new, you come out to them. Every time you join a new job, you do so…and on and on. I think this is because we live in a heteronormative world and to change things we really need to change the very basics of our educational system and society at large. Like, medical books still teach only about two sexes: male and female. So, there really needs to be a lot more education, conversations, discussions, books, movies, and other instruments of disseminating information that is distilled through every aspect of our society.

While there has been some amount of progressive change in different fields, whether the corporate world, media, fashion, or Bollywood, since Section 377 was knocked down and with the spotlight on inclusivity being so strong, a lot more needs to be done. Some of it has been tokenism and some has been genuine – but at least the ripples of change have begun.

On a lighter note, it would be great if someone someday had to say, “I’ve kept this hidden for so long, but now I want to come out about my heterosexuality. I hope you understand.” That would truly be inclusive!

What are you working on next?  

For the moment, I’m concentrating on my day job as an editor of a luxury magazine and relishing all the love that is being showered on The Other Man by bloggers and journalists. I do think there’s more that can be written about the love story between Carlos and Ved, a sequel about what the future holds, but let’s see.

(The Other Man was published by  Lake Union Publishing in October 2021.)