Gay Shopping

India’s first online LGBT pride store is offering a range of products for the community and its supporters.

The fight for the Pink Rupee hasn’t quite started, but azaadbazaar.com, India’s first online LGBT pride store, is already at the head of the line. From themed T-shirts and mugs to home accessories, the site has a whole range of products for people from the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) community and their supporters. “It started about five years ago when I realised people had no way of identifying supporters or other gay people. Of course, it was a very closeted cause then. I wanted to see if people would wear something that identified them as being from the community,” says Sabina, who, along with Simran, a fellow media professional, launched  azaadbazaar in 2008 and went online about a month ago. The two, who prefer not to use their last names, design the products themselves, and make sure the messages on their wares have an unmistakable yet subtle subtext. “Somebody’s mother should be able to wash our T-shirts without asking too many questions.”

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Manju Sara Rajan