Kaidongpham Moirang

Kaidongpham Moirang was formally launched on March 14, 2024. The space nurtures creativity, community building and solidarity amongst the community in the region. The space has already been used to conduct mental health workshops, queer residencies and other events in Moirang town. This unique space has been in the making for years in the hands of the local queer trans community folks. 

 

The significance of the space lies not just in that it’s located in a conflict-torn part of the nation, but also that it’s in a place in Manipur where queer-trans people and their allies have been visible for a long time. In the last two decades, many queer-trans folks have continued resisting heteronormativity in Moirang Lamkhai. Though that resistance is either dying or has evolved into different forms, it has made Moirang Lamkhai an important part of queer-trans heritage in Manipur.

Moirang Lamkhai, lying on Tiddim Road (a highway in Manipur), is probably the most famous junction in Bishnupur district. A road diverges from the junction towards Moirang town, which is 2 km away. The junction is a landmark food market where travellers moving between Aizawl in Mizoram and Imphal in Manipur valley via Churachandpur town (less than 20 km away) and tourists coming to Loktak Lake (4 km away) halt to feast on the delicacies of the culturally rich region.

In Moirang Lamkhai, rice hotels and traditional street food stalls line the highway, lit up with bright lights even at night calling for tourists and travellers to stop at the junction. Though Manipur has been a dry state for much of the recent past, this is also one of the unique spots in the state where liquor was infamously available. The availability of alcohol in these rice hotels was detested by some people, especially if they were run by women. At the same time, women and other marginalized communities have always expressed solidarity with the women-run rice hotels. For instance, Kutthabi, which is run solely by widows. It was conceived through the united workforce of the marginalized, and has become a space that many queer-trans people feel safe and powerful in.

The nearby Bishnupur Bazar in the district’s headquarters and its neighbouring tribal village also have their own forms of gathering amongst queer-trans folks, but Moirang Lamkhai’s ambience provides everyone from the region a place to interact with each other on a larger scale. With the visibility of queer-trans people in the junction and the diversity that the area offers as a crossroad for different communities, the junction has become a ‘happening’ area of the town. Here, queer and trans people have long been visible, actively engaging with larger society. This is amidst visible transphobia, homophobia which the community continues to fight back.

It may be mentioned that Imphal East district’s Khurai borough and Kakching town in the south-east of the valley are other notable places in Manipur with their own stories of queer-trans cultures and activisms coming up organically and thriving through the years.

 

The community queer art and leisure space is a two-room area right in the junction point of Moirang Lamkhai and is currently supported by SAATHII, a non-profit Charitable Trust, headquartered in Chennai, India.

This short essay was previously published at https://vartagensex.org/2024/04/23/at-the-juncture-of-cultures-solidarities-and-differences/