The identity and gender questions have always intrigued me. Whether gender is a matter of soul or of externalities, it needs to be examined with a more accepting mind. I met Abhina and Simran, two transgender women, and wrote their stories.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, November 25, 2011
"I came to life among the 16,000 sperms. I am a survivor. Let me survive."
She was 20 years and struggling with her identity. Underneath her male
garb, she wore women's underclothes. It was liberating to assert her
identity. Gender is what the soul defines, not the genitals.
That's what she told herself then.
"This is one life. This is my life. I shall survive," she recalled.
Abhina Aher, 35, a transgender working in Delhi, survived the snares
of the society, and five years ago, found a Guru, who helped her
through her transition. While taking the oath in front of the leaders
of the seven gharanas of Mumbai in a community home in Byculla, she
discarded all her male stir, vowed never to wear them again and began
to learn the ways of the hijra.
As a project manager for Pehchan, a new five-year project that will
provide HIV prevention services for men who have sex with men and a
part of the HIV/AIDS Alliance, Abhina moved to Delhi a year ago from
Mumbai where she was working for the community previously.
Chandelier earrings dangling from her ears, and her eyes perfectly
lined with kohl, her hair lustrous and her clothes impeccable, she is
yet to get rid of her male organs but her soul has survived the
onslaughts of making it in a society where recognition of the third
sex still has a long way to go.
When the newspapers used the term "eunuch" to define the community
that recently lost 20 of its members to a mishap in Delhi during a
congregation, she felt angry.
"We are fighting against the usage of the term. It is demeaning," she said.
There are too many stereotypes to fight against.
"When they interact with me, they look at me with astonishment," she said.
At the airports, the discrimination is there. Everywhere else, too.
"I have to go with my male name. Sometimes, others don't want to sit
with me. They change their seats," she said. "It is unfortunate."
As the Delhi government tries to establish the issue of "kin" of the
hijras that perished in the fire, Abhina said the issue of identity
lies at the core of their community. At a community congregation in
Nandnagari in East Delhi, hijra community members were trapped inside
the community hall, and many died, and others are still recuperating
from burn injuries in the hospital.
"We have become more alert. We close doors because we don't want
homophobic people to attack us and it has happened in the past. But
that's unsafe," she said.
The government announced a compensation package of Rs. two laks for
the next of each kin of each of the victims after the mishap but they
are yet to ascertain the "closest relative" as the community members
live in communes called gharanas led by the Guru after they leave home
and their families to be reborn as a hijra. As per the UNDP, there are
16 lakh hijras in the country. The community members live in a world
of hierarchies, of bonds that are forged because at some point, they
have all felt trapped within their male bodies, and have felt the need
to free themselves of the burden of their male genitals.
Abhina was born in Mumbai in a middle class family. Her father and
mother were government employees. In the world that she was born and
named as Abhijit Aher, the dreams ended at getting a secure government
job and starting a family. It was a limited world.
At seven, Aher first crossed over. At that age, she didn't know the
world regarded gender as sacred, and something that couldn't flow into
the other.
Her mother Mangala, a folk and Kathak dancer, was like a diva to her.
She donned the ghungroos first.
Her body, she said, felt rhythmic.
"I had a natural tendency to pick up rhythm. My mother was a dancer
and my father played the instruments," she said.
For many years after that day, Abhina struggled with gender and
identity issues.
"I continued being a feminine boy," she said.
At the Marathi medium school in Dadar, she first realized she was only
interested in men. She wanted men to love her as a woman. But her
first sexual encounters were with gay men.
While in school, her mother found out about her relationship with a
neighborhood boy, her best friend, and since then her "reformation"
began.
"I was policed. I wasn't allowed to play with dolls, and my clothes
were monitored," she recalled. "I kept the appearances. I excelled in
outdoor sports. I even did horse-riding."
In college, she was still exploring her sexuality through chance
encounters with men. When she stumbled upon Bombay Dost, a queer
magazine, she knew she wasn't the only one struggling with gender and
identity questions. That's when she started working for the Humsafar
Trust. Those days, she recalled, they had a one-room office and she
operated out the office, and met more transponders.
"I continued with my sexual encounters," she said. "What nobody
understands is we want to be with a man or a bisexual person. I want a
man to love me like a woman. This isn't just about sex but beyond it.
The only men I was coming across were gay men. I appeared as a man,
too."
In Class 12, she came out to her parents. But she continued living at home.
"They had no options. I was the only child," she said.
After years of crossdressing, Abhina decided to find a Guru. At the
different NGOs she worked with, she had spent time working with the
hijra community of Malvani, where she met Shehnaz Nani. She had
already started taking hormonal pills in secret and was helped by the
community members by then.
She joined the Bulakwala Gharana and identified Shehnaz Nani as her mother.
"It was a difficult decision but I did it. If I lived in fear of my
own identity, I wouldn't be able to redeem myself," she said.
She kept going to the Guru.
"Guru, I see you as my mother but if you tell me to beg and borrow and
do sex work, I won't be able to do it," she would tell Shehnaz Nani.
"I needed a mother who would transform me from male to female," she
said."That's out tradition. A culture."
But she continued living with her mother, taking care of her.
In time, her mother reconciled to her son being different.
"She tells me you have given me the love of a son and a daughter,"
Abhina said. "I am providing for her. She is proud of me."
The biological mother and the daughter talk through the nights,
giggling as little girls would do. She inherited her mother's saris
and the ghungroos. Abhina herself is a trained Lavni and Kathak
dancer.
She went to the elders of the community, the leaders of the seven
gharanas and took her oath.
"You have to say we want to be in the mother-daughter or Guru-Chela
relationship and they ask you questions to ascertain whether you
really want to be a hijra," she said. "The Guru needs to have faith in
you. We were bonded. I had to look after the Guru. Shehnaz Nani had
200 chelas at the time. This is our method of taking care of the old
and the infirm. She can't walk now but she is looked after."
Now, Abhina has become a Guru as she is influential in the community
and has a few chelas.
"Once you have a Guru, you do tag and you are reborn. I changed my
name and started wearing three clothes like a female," she said."I was
dying to do it. But I haven't got rid of my male organs. We aren't
forced to. We do it when we are ready."
She faced issues regarding renting a house in Delhi when she first moved here.
"We have to pay extra rent. Much more than what you would pay. So, we
live together to split the high rents. We live by throwing money to
navigate a system that is so much giants us, that doesn't recognize
our sexuality like for instance, the government has announced that
Aadhaar or UIDAI cards will have transgender column. But what do we do
about the base documents like the Pan card. Mine is still in the name
of Abhijit. Passport has "others" and it makes you feel as if you are
an animal. Besides, all government departments need to recognize the
transgender as a separate entity. Without it, we have issues regarding
property rights, and everything else. With Pehchan, we are trying to
address those issues and sensitize the public. One example is the
recent mishap where the government doesn't know about the guru-chela
tradition. There are no castration facilities available. It costs so
much more to do it privately."
Next to her, Simran, another transgender co-worker, nodded.
"We are trying to build a support system. Pehchan has a huge grant and
we are trying to work in 17 states to promote the rights of the
transgender community," she said.
Her day begins early. She lives in Kalyanpuri where she has bought a house now.
"I am from the Poonawala gharana," she said. "I was born and raised in Mumbai."
When she was in Class 10, she told her father she thought she was gay.
He said I was not fit to be in his house so I left home and lived at
the Bombay Central Station for three days. A hijra community member
took fancy to me, and just when we were about to begin our first
sexual encounter, I told her I felt like her.
She took me to her house and took care of me for eight months.
"I learned dancing, worked at a dance bar in Khar, and even did some
sex work but it was painful. I detested it," she said. "My dancing
days were the best time in my life. I had many admirers. I felt wanted
and I made a lot of money, too."
But it was tough living as a hijra.
I was told to wear women's clothes and I was like "why can't I wear
men's clothes and go and work in office to avoid begging and
prostituting myself."
But then, it would have meant cheating myself, she said.
"There was a phase recently in my life where I had to do sex work to
sustain myself and then I got this job," she said. "I have adopted a
daughter. I used to be in Kamathipura and she is the child of a sex
worker who passed away. Three former sex workers take care of her. I
want her to be independent and not form a close attachment as I
wouldn't want to her to feel I did charity for her. It is difficult
adopting children but many hijras adopt children and bring them up. If
it were easier, we would have saved so many children from living on
streets."
Simran hasn't changed her sex yet. On the weekends, she spends most of
her time and money on beauty parlors.
"I like pampering myself," she said.
She faced a lot of discrimination. When she used to take the metro
from Badarpur, where she first lived in a rented accommodation, women
would vacate the seat next to her.
"I felt sad," she said. "I stopped taking the metro which only took 10
minutes to get here and started taking autos that cost me Rs. 120 one
way."
On the flights, most men ask the crew to change their seats as they
feel "uncomfortable" sitting next to a hijra, she said.
"I have been working here for the last one year and 24 days and each
time I walk in the compound, men stare at me and make vulgar comments.
I am tired of 24/7 attention," she said.
Simran hasn't changed her sex yet.
"I am waiting for the legalization of SRS," she said. "I converted to
Islam because that's how the gharanas are geared. We have Hindus too
but I can go to a mosque and pray. Islam doesn't allow for sexual
relations between two men."
For now, she is trying to give back to the community in her own way
and she is happy being what she is.
"We live like the woman that is in us. We spend a lot of money on
jewelry because that is passed on to the chelas and our adopted
children and that's how we live. With no care, with no misgivings,"
she said.
Gender, as we get it from the womb, isn't sacred. What is holy is how
you feel, she said.
"I feel like a nurturer, and I feel like a woman," Simran said.
