This article is by Deya Bhattacharya, Movements Engagement Lead at the international non-profit Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID) and is based on a series of interviews AWID conducted with partners based in South Asia in 2022. In the interest of security, we have withheld names when necessary. LGBTQ+ movements in South Asia are boldly organizing in all their diversities — whether it be through fighting for legal recognition, or artivism, or advocating for harm reduction, or through community support during times of disasters. However, these movements continue to be extremely underfunded, as moving resources to the region has become increasingly challenging, and many groups within the movements remain invisible and out of sight for funders. “In the larger context of South Asia and globally, money means power, and what do we do as LGBTQ+ movements?” Priya*, a trans activist from Dhaka, Bangladesh asks. “Well, as LGBTQ+ activists, we dismantle and destroy power. And that is why many stakeholders want to make sure that money does not reach us.” According to a trans-led group in Pakistan: Winning grants is now no longer a reason for happiness for us. After we have written grant applications, passed technical assessments, spoken to donors about how we would like to use this amount in our work, filled up several forms, comes the biggest hurdle of it all — actually receiving the funds, while advocating with governmental agencies about the usefulness of our work. This is not sustainable! A young queer organizer based in Bhutan pointed out: We are ruled by a unique fear in this country. It is called the fear of revocation of registration certificates. We cannot resource our work, and yet we are always scared that as soon as funder money enters our bank accounts, our registration certificates will be pulled, that the biggest backlash will be the stoppage of our work. The LGBTQ+ movements in South Asia continue to do the trailblazing and critical work of challenging heteropatriarchal systems while having little to no funding support. On an everyday basis, these movements confront misogyny, homophobia, and heteronormativity and often live in hostile contexts at the intersections of gender, sexuality, race, class, caste and disability. This marginalization and resulting power dynamics expose them to a unique set of human rights violations, including particular risks of violence and discrimination in accessing education, healthcare, housing, and employment. They are also routinely marginalized within global LGBTQ+ and feminist movements, and democratic and human rights spaces. This is exacerbated by the constant shrinking of civic space in South Asia as governments use legal and regulatory systems to restrict and suppress dissent. As a consequence, the rights and issues of LGBTQ+ people are severely under-resourced. As the decline of civic space manifests for LGBTQ+ movements and individual organizers in South Asia, it is also important to understand the effects of this continually expanding democratic deficit on resourcing and money flows. Movements within South Asia are experiencing growing restrictions when accessing resources for their work. These barriers include regulations and processes that restrict their ability to access resources, including limiting what can be received, excessive state sanctions when there is a failure to comply with seemingly arbitrary financial regulations, and prohibitions on methods to access resources that bypass regulations. There are also ever more barriers to registering their organizations. This erosion of their collective right to access resources is exacerbated by harassment, violence, discrimination and other forms of intersectional oppression. There is already evidence that only 1 percent of all gender equality funding goes to feminist movements. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been a wave of donors and funders ready to show up for LGBTQ+ movements with increased flexibility, relaxed application and monitoring processes, and, most importantly, more resources and a promise to be more supportive of groups that are operating in hostile and violent contexts. However, feminist groups in South Asia are unable to access these flexibilities because of tightened regulatory oversight by the government.