Fighting for transgender rights

Transgender S. Veena, hailing from a Dalit family, has been through stigmatisation right from childhood, which perhaps made her launch a valiant fight for the rights of sexual minorities.

Hailing from a poor family in Bengaluru, Veena dreamt of becoming a schoolteacher, but her gender shattered her dreams. Though her family loathed her feminine attitude in the attire of a boy and her bodily changes in adolescence, the brave Veena endured solitude in childhood and sneers by potential employers even though armed with an SSLC degree. With no options left, she landed in sex work.

“Sex work and begging are the only options the society has given us”, a visibly-distraught Veena told

The Hindu .

It was the decisive move to undergo Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS) eighteen years back that filled confidence in her that she was no different from others. Ms. Veena’s craving for social acceptance was not merely a personal wish, but it represented the entire community. Taking indifferent politicians head-on, she contested in vain as a corporator from Okalipuram ward of Bengaluru city in March 2010, when she secured 670 out of the 9,000 votes polled.

“Every vote I gained indicates the society’s growing acceptance of a transgender”, she asserted.

Higher plane

Veena’s fight for the rights of sex workers and sexual minorities reached a higher plane after she became a member of the Country Coordination Mechanism on Global Fund. Her fight is now on Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalises unnatural sex.

Terming it a ‘draconian’ law, Ms. Veena wondered how an act of the British regime could be used today to blackmail the entire community of sexual minorities. Her voice rose demanding appointment of transgenders as ‘paralegal volunteers’ in the fight for their rights.

Now she bats for creation of a Transgender Welfare Board to look after job security and livelihood schemes. “She is ready to take her fight to Andhra Pradesh”, says Women’s Initiatives (WINS) secretary R. Meera. Apart from the demand to scrap the Hyderabad Eunuchs Act, Veena wants transgenders brought under the purview of the Domestic Violence Act and Child Protection Act, as the community faces assault, both as children and at home.