Separate public toilets for transgender in Chennai sparks debate

This was filed for the Indian Express and an edited version appeared on March 9, 2009. In my own interactions with the transgender community, I have come across divided opinion on the toilet issue.

Chennai's decision to build separate toilets for transgender
discriminatory: transgenders

Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, March 7, 2009

For many in the transgender community, the Chennai Municipal
Corporation’s decision to build separate public toilets for them will
create toilet apartheid more than anything else.
The government, when it announced the scheme last month, intended to
extend recognition to the community through the construction of
separate toilets and to ease friction with others who may not like to
use the same toilets as the transgender people.
This comes close on the heels of many programs for the transgender
community in Tamil Nadu including the creation of welfare boards,
voter identification cards and ration cards. The state government has
also recently announced it will help homeless transgender find
accommodation and has allocated Rs. 1 crore for group housing project
for the community.
But this time around, the government may not have struck a chord with
those in the community.
Aasha Bharathi, president of the Tamil Nadu Aravanigal Association,
said this would create more isolation for the community. The members
often want to be identified as females and would like to use the
toilets meant for women. This would lead to more acceptance and
integration, she said.
“I don’t agree with it. We want to mingle with the mainstream. And we
don’t want ourselves to be separated like this,” she said. “Using
separate toilets will open great way for discrimination. We want to be
considered as females. In our hearts, we are women.”
According to the government sources, three toilets, which will have
both male and female urinals for those that have yet to undergo the
sex correction surgery and those that have fully transitioned,
respectively, will be constructed as part of a pilot project in south
and central Chennai. Each such toilet is estimated to cost between Rs.
12-15 lakhs and Rs. 45 lakhs have been earmarked for
the scheme in the budget. Construction will begin after the elections
and depending on the response, more such toilets will be built,
Commissioner Rajesh Lakhoni said.
“This was announced in the budget and we have identified areas where
the transgender population is high. We are trying different concepts
and in our meetings, women have said that they won’t like the toilets
if the transgender people use those,” Lakhoni said. “It is extending
recognition of the community and mainstreaming them.”
Lakhoni said a survey was done and about 99 percent said they didn’t
want the transgender people to use the same toilets as they did, which
is why the government thought of building separate toilets for the
community.
The announcement was made in the council meeting in Ripon Buildings.
The first toilet for the transgender community would be built in
Saidapet where it will cater to those living in Kothamedu, Theedeer
Nagar and Athuma Nagar. With this, Chennai is also trying to set an
example for other cities, where rights of the sexual minority still
have a long way to go. There are more than 30,000 transgender people
in Tamil Nadu.
Tamil Nadu is the first state in the country and one of the only few
places in the world that recognizes the transgender community as a
separate sex. Since 2005, it has implemented several welfare schemes
for the transgender community including free sex correction operations
for those willing to go for a surgical operation to help them change
their sex.
All over the world, the toilet issue has generated widespread debate
with some backing separate toilets for the transsexual people and
others calling it a discriminatory policy decision.
In Thailand, the Kamphaeng School in Si Sa Ket, in northeastern
Thailand opened separate toilet facilities to accommodate hundreds of
transgender students last year. Many transgender people have said they
have been groped and harassed in the toilets meant for the men.
Ideally, they would like to use the women’s toilets because that’s how
they identify themselves.
But Rose Venkatesan, India’s first television transgender host who
anchors Ippadikku Rose, disagrees.
She said she this at least recognizes the dichotomy of gender and is a
good start.
“One of the most basic needs is the issue of the toilets and it is a
big problem for the transsexual people because not all of them maybe
surgically operated upon. It is a good
idea but in the long run, I see a society where there is no difference
and all use the same toilets,” she said.
Venkatesan herself uses the women’s toilets. She had issues with the
toilet when she was transitioning from male to female but then given
her celebrity status, she found acceptance quickly, she said.
But she questioned the viability of such a scheme.
“Transsexual people are spread out throughout cities. It is not going to
be economically viable for the city to have so many spearate toilets,”
Venkatesan said. “The ultimate solution would be to spread awareness
about the transsexual people.”
Dr. Lakshmibai, of the Tamil Nadu AIDS Initiative, an NGO that works
with more than 15,000 transsexual people in the state, said she
denounced such a measure which would only reverse what the government
has been trying to achieve – mainstreaming the sexual minorities..
“On one hand, we are trying to make them get accepted as women, we are
trying to mainstream them and you create more isolation. If they have
to use separate toilets, there is more chances of them getting
victimized,” she said.
She said she would protest the move at a meeting of the transgender
association on March 12.
Elsewhere, activists have called it a good move, one that understands
the needs of the community.
Other states, including Delhi and Maharashtra, do not compare well to
Tamil Nadu. “Leave aside separate toilets, they haven’t even extended
voting rights to them,” Ashok Row Kavi, an Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and
Transgender activist based in Delhi, said.