Why Was this Matrimonial Ad Rejected by Every National Newspaper?

This matrimonial ad was rejected by almost every newspaper citing ‘legal problems’. A case of double standards?

Harish Iyer’s mom Padma Iyer is one helluva lady.  Faced with the question of getting her 36-year-old son married, Padma thought of the obvious – she wanted to place a matrimonial ad in some leading national newspapers. Now, Harish is gay and the obvious twist in the tale was that his mother was looking for a GROOM for her son.

Harish and his mom booked a matrimonial ad through an online agency and it was supposed to appear on Saturday, but on Friday they got a refund from the agency. Their ad had been rejected by Hindustan Times and the reason cited was that ‘matter mein kuch legal problems hai’. After this Harish approached other national dailies including DNA and Times of India.

I came out to them. Nowhere did I hide the fact that I was gay, because I wanted them to take a conscious decision of publishing my ad. Not just publish it ki galti se publish ho gaya. So I told them that my mother is looking for a groom for me. After DNA rejected it, it became sort of an activism for me. I wanted to test every newspaper.
– Harish Iyer

Harish finds the attitude of these newspapers to be cloaked in double standards. “All of them run columns and have editorials on the LGBT movement and gay rights to show their progressive side. They run campaigns like Free Your Mind, but what happened to their progressiveness right now?” asks Harish.

Most of these newspapers have ads for escorts, ads for guys looking for beautiful girls who are fair, saying mangliks please avoid. There is blatant discrimination which is allowed over there. My mother has only put – ‘Iyer preferred’ but ‘caste no bar’.
– Harish Iyer

Padma’s matrimonial ad for her son was finally published by Mid-Day on Tuesday and it’s only fair that we have this feisty mom have the last word on the matter:

While we watch our children marching for equality, we are enveloped by the same set of fears - the most common being our child’s loneliness when we are not around.
I knew there were no gay matrimonials only dating sites. People suggested that I start one. I personally thought that to build a different category defeats the purpose of equal rights. I wanted my ad to be silently lodged between all mothers looking for a guy for their girls. But it turns out that it is news.
–Padma Iyer