TMC Nominates Senior Advocate Menaka Guruswamy for 2026 Rajya Sabha Elections as India’s First Openly Queer MP

Key Points:

On 27 February 2026, the All India Trinamool Congress (AITMC) announced four candidates for the upcoming 2026 Rajya Sabha elections. The four candidates are senior advocate Menaka Guruswamy, Babul Supriyo, former West Bengal DGP Rajeev Kumar, and Koel Mallick. The list stands apart because, if elected, senior advocate Menaka Guruswamy would become India’s first openly LGBTQ member of Parliament.

The Rajya Sabha elections are scheduled to be held from 16 March 2026, during which 72 out of the 245 Rajya Sabha seats will be filled. The TMC took to X to announce the candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections.

They wrote, “We extend our heartfelt congratulations and best wishes to them (candidates). May they continue to uphold Trinamool’s enduring legacy of resilience and its unwavering commitment to safeguarding the rights and dignity of every Indian.”

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Guruswamy’s candidacy was welcomed by many for her strong portfolio, especially in her respective field. Nationalist Congress Party spokesperson and LGBTQ rights activist Anish Gawande detailed her résumé in an X post and wrote, “This is an India that’s not willing to wait- an India where LGBTQ+ people are not pieces of token representation but trailblazers in their field.”

Menaka Guruswamy is a renowned advocate at the Supreme Court and a politician from Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. Guruswamy played a vital role in challenging Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalized carnal intercourse against the order of nature. Her legal career began in 1997 when she started working with Ashok Desai, then Attorney General of India.

She completed her graduation and law degrees from the esteemed University of Oxford, Harvard Law School, and the National Law School of India University. After beginning her legal career in 1997, she completed her Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) at Oxford in 2000 and her LL.M. at Harvard in 2001.

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Guruswamy also practiced law as an associate at Davis Polk & Wardwell, headquartered in New York. Davis Polk & Wardwell is regarded as one of the top law firms in the world and is widely recognized for its work in corporate law, litigation, tax, and financial regulation.

Menaka Guruswamy was included in Time’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2019. She was featured on the list alongside lawyer Arundhati Katju. Guruswamy and Katju were part of the team of lawyers who argued the case that led to the decriminalisation of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code in 2018.

She was also one of the advocates who represented the West Bengal government in the 2024 Kolkata rape and murder case. In 2019, Menaka Guruswamy was designated as a Senior Advocate by the Supreme Court of India.

Bengal IT Minister Babul Supriyo, who was also announced as a candidate for the 2026 Rajya Sabha elections, is an Indian playback singer and politician. He began his political career in 2014 with the Modi government and later quit the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2021. He joined the TMC the same year. Koel Mallick is an Indian actress widely recognized for her work in the Bengali film industry.

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