R. Raj Rao (born 1955) is a writer and teacher of literature and one of India’s leading gay-rights activists. His 2003 novel The Boyfriend is one of the first gay novels to come from India. Rao was one of the first recipients of the newly established Quebec-India awards.
Poems from Rao’s BOMGaY collection served as the basis for Riyad Vinci Wadia’s film Bomgay (1996), said to be India’s first gay film. Following the success of The Boyfriend, Rao founded the Queer Studies Circle at Pune University. Rao was one of the first to offer a course on LGBT literature at university level in India.
