Fridae

Huma Qureshi, currently one of Bollywood’s hottest rising stars,  will be part of the campaign called “Ishq ki Ijaazat” (let  love be my right) and has launched a video showcasing Qureshi reciting a poem that questions why love between two people of the same sex is any less meaningful than love between a man and a woman.

The video has garnered over 21,000 views in just under a week since its launch on June 22. The  poem was written by Satyanshu and Devanshu Singh, according toamericanbazaaronline.com.

Creators of the campaign said that they are not aiming to just bring down the colonial-era “Section 377” law that describes same-sex relations as “unnatural” and punishable with life imprisonment but rather, to start an active dialogue about what love really is.

The Supreme Court past December upheld the validity of Section 377, reversing the 2009 Delhi’s high court ruling that decriminalized it and gave the gay community broad protections and rights.

The creators of “Ishq ki Ijaazat” were clear to point out that theirs was a poetic campaign to urge people to talk about love openly and not about sexual preferences.

“It is about a basic right that every human being deserves — to be able to love with dignity, and not prejudice. It’s love, for God’s sake! Give it the respect it deserves,” says the campaign’s YouTube page.

Qureshi is not the first person in Bollywood the Mumbai-based Hindi-language film industry  to take up the LGBT cause, however.

Last December after India’s Supreme Court ruling, actor Imran Khan released his own hilarious Public Service Announcement addressing the “problems” with the gay community and former Miss India Celina Jaitly starred in a Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Bollywood-style  music video to promote its Free & Equal campaign for LGBT people.

You can watch the “Ishq ki Ijaazat” video here: