How Section 377 verdict paves way for those devoid of mental health rights

The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 was quoted by three of the judges in the Section 377 verdict.

It is befitting that mental health was a key focus and an essential aspect of the inalienable rights accorded to the LGBTQIA+ community on September 6, 2018. The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 was quoted by three of the judges in the Section 377 verdict. The colonial-era penal code was questioned against the newer definitions of functioning, illness and finally, rights.

The country’s mental health professionals and premier mental health institutes have often obfuscated and erased their own history of deeply problematic practices and thoughts that have left thousands with irreparable damage. In mere hours after the judgment, stories had started pouring in about the unquestioned malpractice the community had often been subjected to. 

There were transgender individuals who were given electroconvulsive therapy, gay men who were treated for ‘invisible disorders in their brain’ and structured programmes which were created to annihilate and repress any aspect of a person that was non-conforming. The phrase ‘conversion therapy’ doesn’t begin to capture the horror that the marginalised have been subjected to.

ALSO READ: How the SC judgement on Section 377 ties constitutional values with emotion

Most transgender persons are familiar with humiliating psychometric tests used to assess gender dysphoria before they could assert their own right of choice and self-determination. The assessment would often be reflective of the psychiatrist’s agreement with the choice, rather than an objective report. Psychiatrists and psychologists would attempt to ‘counsel’ them against it, or treat it as a strong case of denial. 

Even today, there is no model of sensitisation or caution in this assessment process and there is often a reported sense of violation and harassment. In 2018, the World Health Organisation finally questioned the inclusion of gender dysphoria as a mental disorder and shifted it to the sexual health chapter instead, removing the idea of treatment being associated with gender non-conformity.

The mental health profession has often been critiqued for its comfort with diagnostic labels and its understanding of non-normative as solely a disorder. These understandings have been more rapidly changing and questioned due to the work of activism as well as more queer therapists coming to the forefront. 

However, given the silos that therapists often work in, percolation of alternative understandings takes time and is inhibited by the nature of power structures within the medical profession. The external frameworks used by the mental health profession have had the capacity to oppress the marginalised, just as much as they have provided safe spaces....Read More

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