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Gen Z Trans Women Face Violence for Rejecting Ways of Older Trans Communities

For decades, outcast transgenders in India lived in collectives and relied on begging and sex work to make ends meet, but things are changing.
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An employee at a special railway station for the transgender community on October 27, 2020 in Noida, India. Photo: Sunil Ghosh/Hindustan Times via Getty Images

Payal Rathwa was preparing dinner at home in the western Indian city of Rajkot, when eight people barged in. They were members of a transgender hijra community, a collective of male-assigned and gender diverse people who dress in “feminine” ways and live together. They dragged Rathwa out to the street, stripped her naked, cut her hair and physically assaulted her. They also took pictures of her private parts and released them on WhatsApp groups on February 15.

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Four days later, when they arrived at Rathwa’s door again, she called the police for help and made a formal complaint against her assailants. After a week, they offered an apology in writing to her.

“The local hijra community attacked me because I wear saree, jewelry and lipstick but refuse to join them,” the 22-year-old transgender painter told VICE World News.

Payal Rathwa

Payal Rathwa was attacked on February 15, 2021. Photo courtesy: Payal Rathwa

In India, some young, educated and English-speaking transgender women, who have taken mainstream career opportunities and want to live an independent life, are being harassed and even attacked by a section of older transgender collectives. In different Indian states, these indigenous gender variant collectives can be known as hijra or aravani. 

For centuries, these communities in India had a special place in Hindu and Muslim kingdoms. But colonial laws and attitudes, introduced decades ago, led to transgenders in India having limited acceptance and opportunities. The social safety net the hijra community received in terms of land, provision of food, and money from agricultural households, were removed through British legislation.

They were still invited to dance at auspicious occasions such as weddings and child birth events as part of Muslim and Hindu rituals, but were largely considered social outcasts, and often shunned by their own biological families. 

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Transgender people maintaining social distancing as they wait for a free food distribution in Hyderabad, India on April 29, 2020. Photo: Noah Saleem / AFP via Getty Images

This forced them to live in community households for safety, and rely on low-income, and often, risky illegal professions such as begging or sex work to make ends meet. These professions make them vulnerable to police abuse. Even after receiving legal recognition from the Indian state in 2014, some complained the atrocities against them by the police did not stop.  

Although some transgender women did choose other career options, India recognising transgender people, as “third gender” paved a way for better economic opportunities and societal acceptance for the half a million Indians who identify as transgender. 

As transgender acceptance is getting more mainstream and even trendy with software companies including language such as “we provide equal employment opportunities without regard to gender, sexual orientation, transgender status,” many younger transgender women choose not to associate with hijra communities. 

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They want to live independently and earn as engineers, bankers, lawyers, academics, actors, fashion designers and, even television anchors.

Damini Sinha, a transgender software engineer based in the western Indian city of Pune, who sought justice for Rathwa on social media, told VICE World News, the traditional communities are finding it difficult to accept that transgender women are wearing sarees, bangles and dressing up in feminine ways but "refusing to join them."

Latika Das Randhawa, a 42-year-old transgender model based in the northern Indian city of Ambala was allegedly labelled a prostitute by the hijra community when she contested assembly elections two years ago. “Transgender women are treated as enemies by the hijra community if they refuse to live with them. There is no escape from their vengeance,” Randhawa told VICE World News.       

In a paper titled I am Not a Hijra: Class, Respectability, and the Emergence of the “New” Transgender Woman in India, U.S.-based sociologist Liz Mount noted that newer trans women are “positioning their identities in proximity with middle-class respectable womanhood.”

Ganga, a 26-year-old transgender woman actor from Mumbai says she was assaulted by a hijra community member at a bus stop after she said that she was “not associated” with the community. Ganga said that the attacker pulled down her pants and beat her up till Ganga overpowered her and ran away. One of her friends shared a video of Ganga narrating her experience and tagged the police on Twitter.  The police arrested the accused.

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Ganga

The 26-year-old transgender actor from Mumbai Ganga was attacked by members of a Hijra community. Photo courtesy: Ganga

“Many transgender women are harassed by the hijra community,” Ganga told VICE World News. “But not all have the courage to talk about the torture or report against them to the police.”

Reena Rai, who launched India's first beauty pageant for transgenders, Miss Transqueen India, in 2017, revealed that some of the contestants received threats from a section of the hijra community for choosing modelling as their career.

Vadodara-based Aakruti Patel works with Lakshya Trust, a nonprofit that promotes gender equality. Patel said that she has had eight complaints of harassment of transgender women by the hijra community over the past year. “The clout that they enjoy in the society because of their religious influence among Hindus, who revere them, gives them the licence to harass transgender women,” said Patel.

Fana, 20, who only wants to be identified by her first name for her protection, is a transgender student of fashion design based in the western Indian city of Surat. She said that the seriousness of the abuse is never highlighted because there is lack of awareness among police, who often describe these cases of harassment as an internal matter of the community. “Mostly, police want us to settle it within ourselves,” said Fana, who made a complaint against 25 members of a local hijra community for assaulting her for having long hair last year.

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But activist Amruta Soni, who calls herself a “proud” member of the hijra community, refuted allegations of harassment and said labelling them as “evil,” is “insensitive.”     

Soni told VICE World News, that she was never stopped by her community from living an independent life. “I was always told to do what I wanted,” Soni, a management graduate in the eastern Indian city of Ranchi, said. “I am grateful to the hijra community for giving me shelter at the age of 16, when my educated upper-class family abandoned me.”

Traditional transgender communities are often the only safe haven for child or teenage gender diverse people when they are abandoned or rejected by their biological families.

Studies have revealed that most members of transgender communities remain marginalised and abused within the hierarchical cohabitation system while a section of “authoritative” heads and senior members of the cartels or community households keep control over the money.

Attacks have happened within the community to extort money from members. Last year, in the southern Indian city of Trichy, 25 transgender women from the aravani community were allegedly attacked by aides of their community, for leaving and refusing to pay a percentage of their income, which they term “tax”. In the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, a transgender woman, Hamsa, was immolated allegedly by members of the hijra community after she left the collective.

In 2016, trangender human rights activist Neysara, who uses her first name, started a transgender transition platform called TransgenderIndia.com. Neyasara documented stories of 17 transgender women who emphasised how they are different from members of the hijra community.

“The hijra community exists because of the systematic disenfranchisement of transgenders by the society,” Neysara told Vice World News. “There is a need to emancipate all transgenders by awareness campaign and empower them to make informed choices.”    

Correction: This story originally stated that Fana, the transgender fashion design student, was based in Vadodara and that she was attacked two months ago. She is based in Surat and was attacked last year. We regret the error.

Follow Sonia Sarkar on Twitter.