The Supreme Court in a landmark judgement on April 15, 2014 recognised transgender as the ‘third gender’ and directed the Government to treat them as socially and educationally backward and extend reservations to them in jobs and education. The Government should take steps to bring them to the mainstream of the society, the court added.
When the society is divided between male and female, the common man normally does not accept the existence of a third gender. Transgender is a woman in mind and heart, but a man in body, in other words, a woman trapped in a man’s body.When a child becomes eight or nine years old he behaves like a girl. He loves to wear girls’ attire, play with girls’ dolls, apply girls’ make up to his body, and the boy behaves like a girl. From then he becomes an object of torture, butt of jokes and victim of injustice. Aiswaria, a transgender says, his father sarcastically remarked in the presence of his friends and family members when he was ten or eleven,
“A goat is born to a family of tigers.” His father was a soldier in the army. Sometimes, for no reason his father beat him mercilessly. Either his father considered his son as a transgender to be a social stigma or he thought a transgender born to him a slur on his manliness. Whatever might be the reason, the child became the victim of his anger and dissatisfaction. Not only his father, but his elder brother also beat him for no reason and practices boxing using his shoulder and back as punch-bag. He is discriminated in the school. Boys in the school sneer at him.
They are also sexually abused by the bullies, even by teachers. Aiswaria says when he was in the university doing his MA, he was raped by his classmate. Why didn’t he lodge FIR with the policeIJ Aiswaria answers the transgender being bullied since his childhood by both his near ones and others has lost self-confidence when he grows up; he also does not distinguish between the police and the goons.The police also do not take seriously his complaint of rape as he is not considered a woman; rather there are instances when the transgender going for lodging complaint with the police has been harassed and sexually abused in the police station.
In our art and literature, the transgenders are portrayed as comic characters. In the Ramayan, there is a story. Ramachandra, on returning from his fourteen years’ exile in the forest, finds some persons waiting for him at the outskirts of Ayodhya. He asks, “Who are youIJ Why are you sitting hereIJ” They reply, “We are denizens of Ayodhya. We had come along with others when you started your journey for exile. In this place you said, ‘ladies and gentlemen of Ayodhya , please go back from here and let us undertake our journey alone.’ But there was no direction for us to go back, because we are neither ladies nor gentlemen.”
This story is told to create humour at the cost of the transgenders. Eminent writer Khuswant Singh has twisted the story here to create a joke. He adds, Ramachandra was pleased with the devotion of the transgenders and granted a boon that they would rule India from Delhi from nineteen hundred and forty seven, and he infers, they are ruling India from Delhi since then.
In the Odia film ‘Maa o Mamata’ there is a popular song. “In the day we are called Basant and in the night Basanti….. O lord, what have you made usIJ We neither belong to this side, nor to the other side of the river….” In the films, plays or in novels, transgenders are portrayed comically. Not only the transgenders are laughed at, this kind of portrayal also creates a feeling contempt in the common man towards them, the people look at them differently.
Having been subjected to injustice, torture, discrimination and sexual abuse from the childhood, personality of the transgender does not develop.As a result, most of the transgenders are left with options of three professions i.e. badai (blessings on child birth or in wedding: in the above mentioned story of Ramayan, Ramachandra was moved at the devotion of the transgenders, and granted the boon that they would bless the child, and at the weddings), begging and prostitution. These three are considered as their traditional professions.
‘I am Vidya’ is an autobiography of a transgender. An MA in linguists, Vidya is working for an NGO and is also associated with theatre in Chennai. She had to beg for some days. In the days of his begging, she befriended a person selling goods in the train. He suggested her to do the same. But no one bought from a transgender in the train, as travelers did not buy goods from a transgender, though they buy the same from other sellers. Again she had to go back for begging. Justice KS Radhakrishan said the fundamental rights speak of ‘citizen’, ‘sex’, ‘person’ and all these expressions, which are ‘gender neutral’ refer to human beings.
These take into their fold transgenders and are not limited to male or female gender. Aricle 14 used the expression ‘person’, and Article 15 has used the expression ‘citizen’ and ‘sex’, so also Article 16. Article 19 has also used ‘citizen’, while Article 21 has used ‘person’. “All these expressions, which are ‘gender neutral’ evidently, refer to human beings. Hence, they take within their sweep hijras/transgenders and are not as such limited to male or female gender,” said Justice Radhakrishnan.
In a concurrent but separate judgment, Justice A K Sikri said, “By recognizing transgender as third gender , this court is not only upholding the rule of law but also advancing justice to the class, so far deprived of their legitimate natural and constitutional rights.”
The historic judgment of the Supreme Court is welcome, but many judgments or law made by the legislature are not implemented if they are not accepted by the people. Though there is law against demand of dowry or law against atrocities of woman, people still demand dowry, atrocities against woman still continues.
The people should ask themselves, what is the fault of a transgenderIJ They are not responsible for their birth. Aiswaria’s father mocks at him when he was a child that a goat is born to a family of tigers. Aiswaria is now an administrative officer under the Government of Odisha.His father has retired from service. Aiswaria manages his father’s family, sends money every month to his parents. He also financed for the marriage of his sister.The society is responsible for the condition the transgenders are in, drives them to begging and prostitution; it is the responsibility of the society to bring them back to the mainstream, to allow them to lead a normal life.