The All India Trinamool Congress (AITMC) has nominated Menaka Guruswamy, a senior advocate at the Supreme Court, as one of its candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections, set to take place on March 16. If elected, Guruswamy would make history as the country's first LGBTQ Member of Parliament.
The Mamata Banerjee-led party has also nominated MLA Babul Supriyo, Tollywood actor Koel Mallick, and recently retired West Bengal DGP Rajeev Kumar.
"We extend our heartfelt congratulations and best wishes to them. May they continue to uphold Trinamool's enduring legacy of resilience and its unwavering commitment to safeguarding the rights and dignity of every Indian," TMC wrote in a statement shared on the social media platform X.
Who is Menaka Guruswamy?
Menaka Guruswamy is a constitutional lawyer and a graduate from the National Law School of India University, which she joined in 1992. She began her legal career in 1997 under former Attorney General of India Ashok Desai. According to the book Rising: 30 Women Who Changed India by Kiran Manral, Guruswamy primarily worked on litigation and constitutional matters early in her career.
She later pursued higher studies abroad. She completed the Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) at the University of Oxford and earned a Master of Laws (LLM) from Harvard Law School as a Gammon Fellow. She also practised law in New York at Davis Polk & Wardwell. In 2015, she returned to Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and completed her Doctor of Philosophy (D.Phil.) in Law.
Menaka has served as visiting faculty at top American universities, including Yale Law School, Columbia Law School, and New York University School of Law. She advised the United Nations Development Fund in New York and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in both New York and South Sudan.
In India, she was part of the legal team that challenged Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. She has also been involved in several landmark cases, including matters related to bureaucratic reforms, the AgustaWestland bribery case, the Salwa Judum case, and the Right to Education Act, according to her profile.
In addition, she was appointed as amicus curiae by the Supreme Court of India in a case involving 1,528 alleged extrajudicial killings by the military and security forces. In this role, she assisted the court as an independent legal expert. In 2019, she was featured in Foreign Policy magazine's list of 100 most influential Global Thinkers.
Recently, she represented the TMC in legal proceedings challenging searches conducted by the Enforcement Directorate at I-PAC offices.
