The ICJ has made a submission to Ms. Karima Bennoune, the United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights (“Special Rapporteur”) in response to a call for submission, in advance of her forthcoming report to the General Assembly on how actors from across the cultural ecosystem access and use public spaces and the impact this has on their cultural rights.
ICJ’s submission draws on its ongoing work on the human rights of LGBTQ persons in India and includes findings from the ICJ’s forthcoming report on the rights of LGBTQ persons in the home, at work and in public spaces. The ICJ, concludes that LGBTQ persons’ rights to adequate housing, decent work, and equal access to public spaces are frequently violated throughout India.
The interviews conducted by the ICJ reveals that LGBTQ persons have challenges in accessing a variety of public spaces including streets, public transport, sanitation facilities, cultural and religious events, parks and shopping malls, challenges which are not faced by, or not faced in the same way by, non-LGBTQ persons. The ICJ submits that these findings are in contravention of Indian constitutional law and international human rights law.