OUR STORY
Pride Fund India was founded by Radhika Piramal, Godrej DEI Lab and Keshav Suri Foundation, and is anchored by Dasra. Together, we bring deep experience in institution building, philanthropy, and movement building within India’s LGBTQIA+ ecosystem.
Created with the belief that community-led organisations are best placed to shape solutions rooted in lived experience. To do this work sustainably, they need patient capital, trust, and long-term partnership, not fragmented or short-term support.
Our role is to bridge this gap by bringing together funders, grassroots organisations, and allies into a shared ecosystem that enables collaboration, learning, and lasting impact.
OUR FUNDING PRINCIPLES
Economic agency not only brings a livelihood, but it also brings choice, confidence, and the ability to shape one’s own future. Many face barriers to education, stable jobs, and income because of discrimination linked to sexual orientation, gender identity, caste, class, and religion, often leaving them with few safe work options.
With skills, employment and financial autonomy, LGBTQIA+ individuals can confidently access healthcare, safe housing, and make decisions about their healthy life.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
Healthcare and well-being support go beyond access, which means ensuring LGBTQIA+ individuals receive informed, respectful, and affirming care that centres their lived experiences, free from judgment and stigma.
Many still face judgment in a routine visit to a doctor, misgendering, insensitivity from medical caregivers and outright denial from the services altogether. Even navigating family rejection, bullying, and isolation can often intensify these challenges within healthcare settings.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
Safe Community Spaces provide LGBTQIA+ individuals with a place to feel seen, protected, and a sense of belonging, while empowering them to confidently claim their rights.
Many live in informal settlements, rented rooms under verbal agreements, in Hijra households, or temporary accommodations arranged through peer networks. Given this reality, community becomes a powerful source of strength, connection, belongingness, protection, resilience, care, and rebuilding confidence.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
Access to government services ensures LGBTQIA+ individuals can use welfare programs, healthcare, education, housing, and legal documentation without barriers. It affirms their rights, improves the quality of life, and empowers them to participate fully and safely in society.
Yet systemic barriers continue to limit access to welfare schemes, education, housing, and employment, often making state systems hard to navigate.
It is important to build legal awareness, support policy advocacy, and help communities access ID documents, welfare benefits, and public services. This enables queer and trans people to assert their rights as full citizens.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
Visibility, Narrative & Storytelling is about creating spaces and platforms for storytelling, art, campaigns, and community narratives. By affirming identity and pride, it celebrates queer and trans lives while shifting cultural perceptions toward recognition, respect, and inclusion.
Queer and trans people have long used storytelling to reclaim their narratives, counter stigma, and speak in their own voices. Sharing these truths challenges prejudice, builds empathy, and reshapes public understanding.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
Research and data on LGBTQIA+ communities are essential for shaping inclusive policies, strengthening programs, increasing visibility, and validating lived experiences. Yet, for a long time, there has been a critical lack of information on the needs, realities, and lives of the community. Only in recent years have meaningful initiatives begun documenting and building on these stories.
Research, evidence, curricula, and personal narratives help fill this gap. They not only validate queer and trans experiences but also influence policy, guide funding, and equip organizations to advocate effectively and create lasting impact.
Pride Fund India’s grantees in action:
OUR FOUNDING PATRONS
Our founding patrons saw a need and came together to build a path forward.
https://www.instagram.com/dasraindia/
OUR FUND ALLOCATION PROCESS
We follow a participatory grant-making process with a jury comprising founding patrons, anchor partners, and representative LGBTQIA+ practitioners. Representation by and of different strands of queer and trans communities is a key priority.
