The Trinamool Congress (TMC), the ruling party in West Bengal, has nominated senior lawyer Menaka Guruswamy and three others for the Rajya Sabha elections scheduled for March 16. Apart from Guruswamy, Mamata Banerjee’s party has nominated minister Babul Supriyo, former Bangladesh DG Rajeev Kumar and actor Koel Mallick as candidates.
“We extend our heartfelt congratulations and best wishes to them. May they continue to uphold Trinamool’s enduring legacy of resilience and its steadfast commitment to protecting the rights and dignity of every Indian,” the party said in its announcement posted on X’s website.
Notably, Guruswamy could become India’s first member of Parliament from the LGBTQ community once he is elected to the Senate.
Who is Menaka Guruswamy?
Guruswamy, a senior advocate of the Supreme Court, was among the lawyers who argued the landmark constitutional case, which led to the decriminalization of homosexuality in India after the repeal of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code in 2018.
She began her career in 1997 under former Attorney General of India Ashok Desai, whom she considers her mentor. During this period, she mainly worked on litigation and constitutional matters, according to an excerpt from the book Rising: 30 Women Who Changed India by Kiran Manral.
After about a year and a half, I went to Oxford for graduate studies. In 2001, after obtaining a BCL at Oxford and an LLM at Harvard, she worked briefly as an associate at Davis Polk and Wardwell in New York. She later returned to India and settled in New Delhi.
She was included in Foreign Policy’s 2019 list of the 100 most influential global thinkers, and she and her partner Arundhati Katju appeared in Time magazine’s 2019 list of the 100 most influential people.
Notably, Guruswamy also displays her portrait in the Milner Hall of Rhodes House at Oxford University, making her the first Indian and the second woman to receive the honour, according to excerpts from the book.
Guruswamy recently represented TMC in court proceedings challenging the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) searches at I-PAC offices.
If elected, Guruswamy will become the country’s first openly gay MP.
