UPDATE: Nalsar Queer Collective has given a statement condemning Rohin and supporting Raghavi. You guys should realise that people in the queer community have all been corroborating Raghavi. They are not coming out in public because of the stigma attached. Not everyone has Raghavi's courage.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DP3h0LzD5dG/

Just a clarification regarding mis-gendering. Y’all are correct in using she/her pronouns for Raghavi because on her X profile she lists those pronouns and publicly identifies as a trans woman. She has embraced being a woman after transitioning both physically and emotionally. But Rohin uses they/them pronouns and filed a PIL explicitly seeking recognition for these pronouns. In Rohin’s response to the allegations, they specifically mentions that they is a non-binary person and not a male. So for Rohin it would be appropriate to use they.

Someone has pointed this out, but the moderator partly censored it because this person used the F word. I am explaining it properly.

Also, OpIndia’s attack against Rohin shows that the BJP and RW ecosystem have a vested interest in seeing Rohin punished, so we need to exercise caution.

Hahaha. Liberal and conservative minds are so different. Y’all think they’re reporting on this because Robin Bhatt is so scary and important to the right? Why ? Because of all the votes and people he can move or the money he can donate ?

When OP India writes these stories - understand it’s not because the people are important. It’s because they a) want to get their audiences laughing at how corrupt and hypocritical their opposition is and b) they want their audiences to absorb the cultural message that the left is this way, this crazy, this perverted, this corrupt, this amoral.

Maybe it was the Indira Jaising connection if anyone that made them write it. But it’s not because RB is some big deal to them. He’s just a joke and some canon fodder.

First of all, before we address the allegations, we must acknowledge a couple of things.

1. Rohin is a formidable young human rights jurist and one of the leading queer voices among Gen Z. To those asking why he studied Bioethics at Harvard, please read up on Foucault’s theory on bio power. The intersectionality between this theory and jurisprudence is of the most important scholarly developments this century, especially on queer rights jurisprudence.

2. GNLU is a college where unfortunately 90% of students have opted for law firm careers and ended up doing nondescript jobs at CAM and SAM. If people have gone abroad for higher studies, it has mostly been as a stepping stone towards law firm careers. Being a GNLU alum, Rohin has pursued an unconventional, non-monetary career path. This has marked him out as perhaps the most well-known alum of GNLU and someone who can inspire present batches to look beyond law firms.

Now coming to the allegations, we have one person say he touched her inappropriately and Rohin’s statement suggesting that he never exercised power over her (I am assuming he means “power” in an all-encompassing Foucauldian sense, beyond the legal sense of a master-servant relationship). To gauge whether it is a serious case of SH or a friendship gone sour, we need eyewitnesses and others to corroborate the allegations. That has not happened. Instead, a lot of RW accounts, and people perhaps jealous of Rohin’s Ivy League background, are trolling him.

I am happy to stand with Raghavi, but I need some corroborating evidence or testimonials from others. It’s also notable that Rohin’s senior Indira Jaising has maintained her silence. Maybe because she thinks like a lawyer and does not undertake a trial by social media?

TLDR: Rohin basically denies and calls Raghavi a liar. Rohin also clarifies that he is a non-binary person. Raghavi says she is “sad and disgusted”. She insists there are other survivors but no one else has publicly come out yet.

So as of now it’s one person’s word against the other. Meanwhile, in left-liberal circles, Teesta Setalvad and Manu Sebastian (Managing Editor of Livelaw) have publicly tweeted in support of Raghavi. But Rohin’s mentors like Indira Jaising, Karuna Nundy and Menaka Guruswamy are silent as of now. One of his mentors Sanjoy Ghose has given a statement distancing himself from Rohin, but not directly commented on the allegations.

Thus, perhaps the matter should be kept in abeyance unless more people come out? Also, OpIndia’s attack against Rohin shows that the BJP and RW ecosystem have a vested interest in seeing Rohin punished, so we need to exercise caution.

Just giving a very objective view.

https://x.com/BhattRohin/status/1978020469379911824

https://x.com/Lawyer_Saheba/status/1978029274243141683