New Delhi: The Pride Fund India initiative, which supports LGBTQIA+ communities, has published an assessment that reads like a progress report and a quiet indictment of the country’s social systems. Covering April to November 2025, Pride Fund India’s review maps the work done across eight states through 13 grassroots organisations: a snapshot of what steady funding can achieve for communities historically cut out of public welfare, healthcare and formal employment.The Pride Fund finding states where community-led systems step in, queer people survive and even thrive. However, where the state and institutions stay absent, discrimination flourishes unchecked. Legal victories may decorate courtrooms, the report suggests, but they have not dismantled lived inequality. Speaking to The Wire on what the review reveals about the gap between law and lived experience, queer-rights scholar Akshay Khanna said: “Recognition on paper doesn’t guarantee dignity in real life.” He further notes, “What this review shows is that community-run interventions are doing the heavy lifting that institutions should have taken up years ago.”Healthcare: The first, and still the fiercest, battleHealthcare appears as the most urgent frontier, according to the report, not because of medical complexity but because of the routine indignities queer and trans people face inside hospitals. Misgendering, moral judgement, denial of treatment and outright hostility remain widespread. Addressing why healthcare keeps emerging as a crisis point in queer rights, physician and educator Aqsa Shaikh told The Wire, “Healthcare is where stigma becomes policy without ever being written down.” She added, “People are turned away not by law, but by bias.”The report further highlights that despite these barriers, Pride Fund India’s grantees supported 1,513 individuals with gender-affirming care, counselling, screening and mental health interventions. The scale of this outreach reflects both need and the exhaustion of navigating a hostile healthcare system. Mitwa Samiti, a community-based organisation facilitating essential documents for transgender individuals through welfare centres, provided hormone therapy to 24 people and laser treatment to 20 others in this duration, offering rare access to medically supervised gender-affirming procedures in spaces where dignity is not up for negotiation.Naz Foundation’s NAZ Dost helpline, which offers counselling, coming-out support, safe-sex guidance and legal aid to queer people, conducted more than 1,095 calls, a stark barometer of the community’s daily battles: anxiety, family rejection, and STI worries that many are too afraid to take to mainstream hospitals.Basera Samajik Sansthan, a transgender-led community organisation supporting people living with HIV and other chronic conditions, ran mind-body wellness workshops for 60 members, anchoring care in both physical and emotional health. Meanwhile, in a rare rural, community-driven health-mapping effort, the Karna Subarna Welfare Society surveyed 290 transgender and gender-diverse people in West Bengal, enabling screening for HIV, syphilis, Hepatitis B and C, and tuberculosis.These numbers are substantial for community-led interventions, but demoralising when contrasted with the near-absence of mainstream health systems. Asked whether community-run care can remain the backbone of queer health, Naz Foundation founder Anjali Gopalan said, “If the public health system doesn’t evolve, we will continue depending on community networks to fill life-saving gaps. That model is heroic, but not sustainable.”Economic independence: The long road to dignityEconomic vulnerability is the predominant issue running through most queer lives. Without documentation, safe schooling or workplace acceptance, queer and trans people often have no path into formal employment. Pride Fund India’s review recognises that livelihoods are not just income; they are dignity in motion.The report states that, in 2025, 316 people were trained across hospitality, stitching, digital literacy, beautician work, driving and financial literacy, with 74 individuals securing jobs or launching small enterprises. Deepshikha Samiti trained 128 participants, placed 46 in employment and helped 28 set up home-run businesses. At the AASRA shelter, Tweet Foundation trained trans men through a partnership with Hamdard Hospital, offering work-ready skills to a group often shut out of formal skilling programmes. Karna Subarna Welfare Society developed rural livelihood models in mushroom cultivation, spice processing, poultry and textile work; options tailored for regions where formal hiring remains scarce and stigma often decides who gets a chance.The organisation is still vocal about the gap between skilling and stability. Without stipends, workplace safety, identity documents, mental health support and employer sensitisation, the uplift remains fragile. Responding to this gap, labour rights expert Ashwini Deshpande said, “Skilling without structural support is like giving someone a boat with no oars. You are technically afloat, but nowhere close to moving forward.”Safety and shelterAs per the report, safety remains a daily negotiation for queer people; at home, in public, in institutions and workplaces. Pride Fund India’s partners worked on legal literacy, crisis intervention and documentation support, acknowledging that safety is multidimensional. Basera Samajik Sansthan trained 75 transgender individuals in collaboration with legal service authorities. The Naz Foundation ran rights-based capacity-building programmes on domestic violence and POSCO for sex workers and trans women.Tweet Foundation continued operating AASRA, one of India’s few dedicated shelters for trans men, while launching a Digital Garima Kendra to support identity documents and government services. Sensitisation sessions with the Delhi Police and a local church signal small but meaningful shifts in institutions historically associated with exclusion and fear.Speaking to The Wire on the concern of systemic safety, activist Grace Banu said, “For queer people, safety is not the absence of violence; it’s the presence of systems that won’t abandon them when violence happens.”Culture, visibility and narrative powerBeyond survival, the report highlights the power of visibility grounded not in token Pride imagery but in community-driven cultural work. Sappho for Equality’s Rongdhonu Mela showcased 46 queer and disabled entrepreneurs and drew more than 3,000 visitors. In Karnataka, Payana trained trans theatre artists and staged five productions reaching over 650 people. Sappho is also translating foundational queer texts and preparing Bioscopia, a queer film festival in Kolkata, signalling a shift toward community-owned archives and narrative spaces.These interventions indicate that community organisations are not merely responding to crises but shaping culture and public imagination. When asked about what visibility means in this context, writer Sunil Mohan puts it to The Wire, “Visibility is not decoration; it is documentation. It is how a community saves itself from erasure.”Institutional barriers and challenges aheadThe Pride Fund India review shows persistent structural barriers: routine misgendering in hospitals and government offices, lack of identity documents, workplace harassment, collapsing rural market linkages, burnout among small CBO teams and the constant weight of stigma. These pressures cause programme dropouts driven not by disinterest but survival needs.The report argues that the most effective interventions are those co-designed with the community: models where safety nets, stipends and mental health support are foundational, not optional.Over seven months, Pride Fund India’s partners enabled 1,513 people to access healthcare, 316 to receive training, 74 to secure livelihoods and 110 to obtain legal empowerment, while 726 participated in cultural initiatives. Three queer publications and one livelihood-mapping study were also produced.The report warns that queer dignity hinges on whether institutions; healthcare systems, labour markets, welfare schemes, local administrations, can evolve at the pace at which communities are rebuilding themselves. Asked what queer communities demand today, Banu said, “Queer people are not asking for acceptance anymore. They are asking for resources, recognition and the right to live without negotiation. The question is whether India is ready to meet them halfway.”