Asian Gay Doctor Kills Himself After Rejection from Family
A young medic took his own life two days after his family told him to find a "cure" for his sexuality, his devastated fiance has told Sky News.
Matt Ogston said he moved from Birmingham to London to live openly with his partner of 13 years, Nazim Mahmood, who feared there would be "catastrophic" consequences if his family found out he was gay.
But during a trip home to celebrate Eid in July, Dr Mahmood was confronted by his mother and felt forced to tell her he was planning to marry a man.
Mr Ogston said: “The reaction was underwhelming and also surprising - the reaction was to basically ask him to see a psychiatrist to find a cure.
"When he asked 'why do I need to find a cure, there's nothing wrong with me, I'm just a good person trying to live a good life,' that must have created such a sadness within Naz.
"I only wish I'd had longer to have spoken to Naz, to try and talk things through and just tell him it would be okay."
Dr Mahmood, 34, who ran a successful clinic offering cosmetic treatments, died after falling from the balcony of his fourth floor penthouse flat on 30 July.
The Shrien Dewani case shone a spotlight on one of the last taboos for many members of Britain's Asian communities - homosexuality.
The subject is rarely talked about and coming out is extremely difficult in most cases, and impossible in others.
In extreme cases gay Asian men and women face violence, or even death.
'H' comes from a wealthy, middle class family from a big town in Pakistan.
While he was still at college he was outed by a member of his extended family.
The reaction was predictably violent. 'H' was given a choice: exorcism or death.
"They take a stick and they burn it on your hands and parts of your body," he said.
"And you scream. And they think the demons are leaving your body. That happened to me several times."
'H' lied to live. He said the painful exorcisms had "cured" him, but his lover refused to renounce his homosexuality.
He was beaten to death by his own father. 'H' heard the screams for help.
Seeking refuge in Britain, 'H' thought attitudes here would be different.
But instead the same prejudices that exist in the subcontinent have been transferred to successive generations born and raised in this country.
Jasvir Ginday, a bank worker from Walsall, is serving a life sentence for murdering his wife, Varkha Rani.
The two were married in a lavish arranged marriage in Punjab, India. It was a marriage that Ginday had himself helped to arrange.
But on her arrival in this country Varkha Rani discovered her husband was gay.
Detective Superintendent Sab Johal investigated the murder and soon discovered Gindal was active on Birmingham's gay scene and did little to hide his sexuality.
"We know for a fact that his friends knew he was visiting the gay quarter," he said.
"He came here with his friends. So he was more than happy to be a gay man here, but yet he still played the part of somebody that was prepared to get married.
"He went to India and duped a young girl to come over here. That makes his crime even more malicious."
Some Asian parents force their gay sons and daughters into marriages in the mistaken belief that heterosexual sex will "cure" them.
Detective Sergeant Trudi Runham is one of West Midlands Police's most experienced officers dealing with the issue.
Her Team Sentinel unit has rescued gay men from forced marriages. She says the number of cases is increasing.
"Nationally 20% of referrals for forced marriages are men. And we know that some of those are gay men," she said.
But there are some signs of change.
Yatin Mistry is from an orthodox Hindu family. Telling his parents he was gay was the most difficult thing he has ever had to do.
"My dad's initial reaction was 'look son, I'm not happy. But I love you, you're still my son'.
"What's going to be difficult is how society is going to react and how your mum will react.
"My mum cried. She blamed herself, saying 'what have I done? I must have done something wrong'. The whole coming out process took over a year."
But now the IT analyst is planning to marry his boyfriend. And he has his parents' blessing.
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