Gaya International Airport will keep 'GAY' code, despite conservative push to change it

Gaya International Airport is staying "GAY."

The airport in Gaya, India will keep its three-letter code despite numerous requests to change it, including from a conservative lawmaker and Air India.

Bhim Singh, a member of the Indian Parliament's upper house Rajya Sabha, recently submitted a written inquiry pressuring the International Air Transport Association (IATA) to change the code, claiming it makes people “uncomfortable." Singh said in his inquiry, obtained by The Hindustan Times, that the abbreviation is “socially and culturally offensive” and that it should be changed to “a more respectful and culturally appropriate code.”

Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, originally enacted under colonial rule by the British Raj, criminalized same-sex sexual relations as "carnal intercourse against the order of nature." It was in effect for 70 years after India gained independence from the United Kingdom, before it was struck down in 2018 by the country's Supreme Court.

While same-sex relationships are no longer criminalized in India, LGBTQ+ people still struggle to find acceptance socially and legally. The court rejected petitions for marriage equality in 2023, and just 53 percent of adults said in a poll from the Pew Research Center the same year that same-sex couples should be able to legally marry, compared to 43 percent against it.

Minister of Civil Aviation Shri Murlidhar Mohol has since issued a written response to Singh, acknowledging that while "requests for changing the code of Gaya have been received in the past by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Airports Authority of India," the organizations have no intentions to change it.

Mohol explained that the three-letter airport codes, also known as IATA location identifiers, are assigned by the IATA to "facilitate identification of airports across various travel-related systems and processes," and that they are "generally assigned using the first three letters of the location's name where the airport is situated."

Because the codes are "primarily intended for commercial airline operations and are issued at the request of airline operators," airlines can request to change them. Mohol said that Air India had earlier asked IATA to change the airport code, but that there is not a good enough reason to change it.

"Assigned three-letter codes are considered permanent and are altered only under exceptional circumstances, usually involving air safety concerns," he concluded.