Fostering Pride in Higher Education: The Road to Inclusion

Pride Circle Foundation - Ramkrishna Sinha, Betilda Jhansi, and Paul Suranjan
IIM Ahmedabad - Prof. Errol D’Souza, Shubham Singhal, Ruhika Darbare, Bala Abirami K C, Resham Jalan, and Ankita Singhania

A campus is a place where lively, ambitious, and diverse young people come together and their young ideas are given expression and individual interests nurtured through clubs and associations that lay the foundation for harnessing talent and unlocking potential. But sadly, such support groups for the LGBTQ+ community are conspicuous by their absence on most Indian campuses. The growth of these students is hampered by the lack of an inclusive environment where most of them face discrimination, and feel differently treated by their peers. This report published by Boston Consulting Group, Pride Circle Foundation, and Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad delves into the ground-realities of the inclusivity issues faced by LGBTQ+ students on Indian campuses through a survey of over 1700 students in colleges across India. It demonstrates how the establishment of a diversity and inclusion (D&I) student interest group can offer these students greater representation and improve the quality of their campus experience and offers guidelines for the establishment of such a group.