A beauty pageant for the transgender community took place in India's northern Haryana state on Sunday (Aug 27).
Sixteen participants representing different Indian states walked the runway during the Miss Transqueen India contest.
Nitasha Biswas, a 26-year-old postgraduate in business management from India's eastern Kolkata city, was crowned the winner.
Loiloi from India's northeastern Manipur state bagged the first runner-up position, and Ragasya from India's southern Chennai city was crowned the second runner-up.Transgender people are often driven to the fringes of Indian society, with many forced into begging and prostitution.
In April 2014, India's apex court recognised transgender as a legal third gender, and called on the government to ensure equal treatment, but abuse and exploitation are still widespread.
Many of 490,000-strong community lack formal education and are denied jobs.“While there is no shame in being gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or intersex or even straight,” says Ramesh Bais, a member of parliament from India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, “there is most certainly shame and dishonor in being a homophobe, a transphobe and a bigot." Nitasha Biswas, on Sunday, created history by bagging the Miss Trans Queen 2017 title at a beauty pageant held in Gurugram.
Nitasha is a 26-year-old trans woman who hails from Kolkata. A student of St. Xaviers Kolkata, Nitasha completed her management studies and moved to Delhi to pursue a degree in fashion.
Nitasha decided to pursue modeling and took it up a year ago in Delhi.
Speaking about her journey to The Better India she says, “From a very young age I knew I was a gender dysphoria. I knew I wanted to change this, but at the same time, I knew I needed to complete my basic education.”
“I used to constantly Google to find out about transgenders. I remember the moment I finished my college; I flew to Delhi to start my journey.”
Nitasha lost her mother at a young age, and it was her father who played both the roles. She talks very fondly of her family and says, “Initially it was tough for my father to accept that his son was going through a transformation. In fact, it impacted him so deeply that he stopped talking to me for almost seven months. That was perhaps the toughest part of my conversion – not having my family beside me.”=
The process of transformation is not an easy one. Nitasha spoke about the Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) that one has to undergo and the physical and emotional toll that it takes on the body.
“During the transformation process, there is a phase when you have both male and female attributes, and it was impossible for me to even step out of my house during that period. It was a lonely journey. I was a source of a lot of ridicule.”
Through this journey, Nitasha has lost many friends and family but what kept her going was her belief in herself. Nitasha has also had to undergo rigorous psychological sessions to help her cope with the situation.
Today Nitasha’s father and brother both participate in her happiness and are proud of the achievements that Nitasha has.
“Winning the title has been great. Everyone is still in the celebratory mood around me.” Nitasha’s next port of call is Thailand where she will be representing India in the Miss Trans Queen International.
When asked about the highs and lows that she went through as she was preparing for the pageant she said, “This journey has been of emotions. With every conversation I had with my fellow contestants the things that were common were – depression, loneliness, and a lot of pain. The moment the crown was placed on my head, I thought of all the people I have lost in my journey in getting here. It has been a difficult and sometimes painful journey, but I am glad I stuck to it.”
Nitasha views are winning the pageant as one that comes with a lot of responsibility. She wants to use this platform that she has been given to work towards making it a little better for transgenders.
She says, “Many transgenders go through a lot of emotional pain and severe depression. In fact, because of not getting mainstream jobs, they often have to resort to taking up sex work. This is what needs to desperately change.”
As we end our conversation, she says, “Let’s learn to be humane. Gender is not something that is defined by what is in between your legs. Gender is just a notion in our minds. I was nurtured and brought up by my father who played both the gender roles – he was a mother and a father to me.”
She also said, “I am not asking for any rights from any of you. By doing that I will be automatically put you on a higher pedestal. The rights you have, I have too. Let’s just learn to open our hearts and accept.”We wish Nitasha all the very best for the Miss Trans Queen International pageant.
This strong public acknowledgement of the LGBT community, long marginalized in India, introduces and sets the tone for a new report on transgender rights by parliament’s Social Justice and Empowerment Committee. The report, presented to parliament last week, examines a draft bill on transgender rights – the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill – introduced in parliament in August last year.
Indian transgender communities, as well as Human Rights Watch, have flagged concerns over the draft law. The bill contradicts several provisions laid down in the watershed 2016 Supreme Court ruling that transgender people have the right to self-identify as male, female, or third gender; that the government should ensure their fundamental rights without discrimination; and that they should receive special benefits in education and employment. The new report addresses these concerns, and also notes the bill’s failure to properly define discrimination, its silence on penalties for those who violate transgender rights, and the absence of an option for transgender people to bring a complaint if they are mistreated or abused.
The report also notes that the draft law fails to properly protect transgender people from rape and sexual assault. Significantly, it points out that they remain at risk of arrest and prosecution because section 377 of the Indian Penal Code criminalizes same-sex sexual relations.
The report slams the bill’s definition of transgender people – as “neither wholly female nor wholly male,” “a combination of female or male,” and “neither female nor male,” – as “unscientific and primitive,” and one which “completely misunderstands trans identities” and severely restricts their right to self-identify.
The Indian government should amend the transgender rights bill to ensure that transgender people can self-identify their legal gender without unwanted intervention from committees or experts, be they medical, psychological, or anyone else. And this alone should form the basis for their access to all rights, social security measures, benefits, and entitlements. Only then can the law support the communities it seeks to protect and empower. The parliamentary committee, headed by Bais, has made a great start in backing trans rights in India. Now it’s up to the government to not only enact a good law, but repeal the colonial legacy of section 377 as well.
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