10 years of NALSA judgment: What has changed for transgender community

For Muskan, that reclamation means a gender-affirmation surgery. For others, it’s the ability to vote for the first time as a transgender person. For yet others, it’s the simple experience of walking into a public washroom without ugly glares from occupants. It was a journey partly made possible by the Supreme Court judgment of 2014 in the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) vs Union of India case that ruled that transgender people — 4.8 lakh as per the 2011 Census — deserve the same rights as everyone else in the country: to education, employment, healthcare and movement around the country.

While the judgment helped transgender people stake their claim on public spaces and equal opportunities, the Central government’s law and rules of 2019-2020, which mandated proof of surgery/hormone treatment before issuing a gender-change certificate, made the journey tougher. The rules omitted any mention of reservations in the public sector and gave less punishment for sexual abuse against trans women vis-a-vis cisgender women.

Yet, 10 years after the historic verdict, the needle on trans rights has moved. Trans activists such as Akkai Padmashali in Karnataka, Vyjayanti Vasanti Mogli in Telangana, Santa Khurai in Manipur, Amarjeet Shergill in Jharkhand, Sanjana Singh in Madhya Pradesh, Grace Banu in Tamil Nadu and Anindya Hazra in West Bengal have mobilised their communities to work with lawyers and state governments to improve access and visibility of trans people in public. In recent elections, many trans people also voted for the first time with their government documents reading not ‘male’ or ‘female’ but ‘third gender’.

Maya Nayak after voting in Lok Sabha elections (Credit: Source)

Voting for Change

Take Maya Nayak, 27, from Karnataka’s Yadgiri district. She remembers a time of poverty, the uncle who raped her when she was in third grade, her father who beat her for “being girlish”, and also her mother. She’d be forced to go to the market to sell fruits and bring back money so her father could buy alcohol. It was on one such trip that she was approached by civil society members who asked her if she wants to come with them and work for the community. She decided to do it.

That was the beginning of her financial independence. The organisation paid her Rs 1,700 monthly, and she eventually went for mental health counselling which paved the way for her gender-affirmation surgery.

In last year’s state elections, after changing her government documents to ‘third gender’, she voted as a legally recognised trans woman for the first time, and did the same for this year’s national elections. She was even chosen by the Election Commission as a voter awareness ambassador. “I would go on stage and tell people not to vote for those who give us free alcohol, money or clothes. I wanted politicians to know that we, the trans people, are here and will vote,” she says, adding how she formed a WhatsApp group for everyone to send in a photo of their inked fingers. She proudly says that of the 2,000 trans people in her district, 97 per cent showed up at the polling booth. “Change is slow, but important… I was born a man, and then became a woman. I always knew I wasn’t cis gender. I was very happy when my documents reflected that. After my counselling and surgery, I felt I had died and come back to life.”

Maya Nayak as Election Commission Ambassador (Credit: Source)

However, for most trans people in India — who have low access to literacy and are forced to resort to sex work/begging in the absence of employment opportunities — safe and affordable healthcare remains out of reach. Affordable testing centres for HIV, a common ailment in the community, are rare, as are dedicated clinics for trans people. Walking into a government hospital where staff isn’t sensitive about trans rights can be humiliating.

Veronica Ratra, 24, a forex and binary trader from Faridabad, can testify, having been to the new trans OPD at Delhi’s Ram Manohar Lohia hospital many times since its feted opening in September. Many patients have criticised it for having absent, uninformed and often junior doctors; poor management and equipment; and a short duration of just two hours every Friday afternoon. Besides, in government hospitals, breast implants are not paid for, even if surgery is, making the procedure prohibitively expensive at about Rs 2 lakh.

“People in the psychiatry department behave badly with us. They act like they’re doing us a favour,” says Ratra, who is currently undergoing mandatory counselling at the hospital before her surgery. “I may be able to afford surgery elsewhere, but what about other trans people? Ninety per cent are economically backward and can’t afford the implant… 19-20 year-olds are wandering helplessly in the hospital premises because the departments are scattered. They should be guided.”

Ratra is outspoken and assertive, refusing to put up with bullying even as a teenager. Having grown up with a high-pitched voice, mostly female friends and “dolls instead of balls”, she decided to work for her community after a queer friend in school was cornered in a bathroom, before being urinated and masturbated on. “This was when queerness was still illegal. I realised I must do social work, I must help people,” she says.

This sense of responsibility to the community has united many trans people across the country. Rakshita Mallikarjuna, 33, from Bengaluru, left a career in the private sector because of the allegedly rampant discrimination and now works to improve healthcare facilities and police interactions for trans people. She has helped constitute a committee of medical experts and doctors to raise awareness among the community and works regularly with police departments to ensure trans people filing cases are not harassed.

Rakshita Mallikarjuna

Rakshita talks of an incident from a decade ago when she was raped by local thugs in the middle of the night. She had run up to the police station, wrapping a banner around her, but changed her mind, fearing that the officers might arrest her or file a case, a harassment that trans people in her area often faced. She says she turned, ran back home and faced her mother at the door, who started beating her, suspecting her of sex work.

“It takes years to change mindsets. Basic sensitisation of government (officials) has to be done… There should also be transparency in the private and public sector. Corporates are only concerned with slogans of diversity and inclusion but don’t focus on the equality that entails,” she says, recalling her own experience at tech companies.

“My manager put a barricade between me and other employees/clients. When I raised my voice, she’d say, ‘This is not a human rights organisation, this is a corporate’. I’d respond, ‘We are not slaves.’ If you cross a line, you are targeted. The HR department doesn’t help, they ask you to resolve the issue within the team. Trans people are leaving jobs because of harassment,” she says.

Amarjeet Shergill (right) after voting in the Lok Sabha elections (Credit: Source)

In the public sector, Karnataka remains the only state to institute a one per cent horizontal reservation in civil service employments for trans people. Madhu, 35, a trans woman from Karnataka’s Shimoga district, is one such beneficiary, first working as a district coordinator, then as a Group D officer in a taluk court. Now she’s planning to move to Bengaluru, expecting a job at the High Court. “I was told to dress the way I wanted and be myself. The officials (have been) very encouraging and told the staff to treat me as an equal,” she says.

Growing up, Madhu did face taunts about her femininity. She did manual labour to become more “manly” and was even forced to cut her hair. However, she later realised that her experience of gender is not unique — there were others like her. Six years ago, she adopted a boy, now 12-years-old, who is HIV-positive.

Small cities, big fight

Amarjeet Shergill, 27, a trans woman from Jamshedpur, points out that Jharkhand, like several states and UTs such as Delhi, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Tripura, Assam and Mizoram, doesn’t have a functioning trans welfare board.

“In a small city, there’s no support. Everyone struggles. Gurus (community leaders of trans shelter homes) don’t support you much,” she says.

While southern states such as Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka have fared well in trans-friendly policies, northeastern states have been ignored in mainland queer activism.

Santa Khurai, a trans activist from Manipur, said in an earlier interview to this paper, “(Mainland) people hardly know the history of Manipur… When I talk about the (Meitei-Kuki) conflict and how it has affected trans people, (mainland) people talk about chosen families. Even the idea of a chosen/immediate family is understood differently here… There’s less visibility of northeastern trans people in the national movement.”

Santa Khurai, trans activist from Manipur (Credit: Source)

With no credible government data, invisibilisation of trans men in activist circles, and ignorance about gender and sexuality even among the educated populace, transgender people — especially the underprivileged — have a long fight for recognition ahead of them. While there are legal milestones, senior advocate Jayna Kothari says that the 2019 law remains problematic.

Muskan, the analyst in Gurugram, says that when she speaks out, she thinks of the young ones at her workplace who are grateful that she’s around, because she’s the only openly transgender person in an organisation of more than 2,000 people. She thinks of a trans teenager who recently attempted suicide, living alone in Delhi without any support from his family. She knows he’s not the only one because she was once like him.

“If I go back to Bihar, I’ll be killed or given testosterone treatment. Politicians only mention men and women in their speeches. (For trans people), they may mention gods who change their gender. But we pick up the Constitution of India,” she says, invoking Article 15 that guarantees protection from discrimination on grounds of sex or gender. She adds, “When I came to this city, I was confused and had been suppressed for a long time. Now, I speak out.”

With inputs from Aditi Nadig.