In a colourful room, in a quiet neighbourhood, Chennai-born Malaika Desingh brushes her hair with a pace that’s hard to follow. She puts on some red lipstick before adorning her ponytail with a rainbow-coloured hairpin. Gone are the days when she had to hide her gender orientation from her family. Today, she is an emerging actress and a model whose beauty has earned her regional recognition. She has also turned her drive to fight against the odds as a transgender woman into a fervid activism. She is the the Media Relations Officer of Born2Win, a social welfare organisation with emphasis on education, environment and employment. Desingh explains that in Chennai, and in India’s deep South, more broadly, prostitution and other pernicious practices have long been common means of survival against a persistent backdrop of stigma and marginalisation.
The challenge
T ill some years ago, it was not uncommon for transgenders to struggle for long-term jobs that would help them pay their rent and secure mental health. The uphill battle of coming out in the professional sphere is something Desingh experienced first-hand, though to a different extent. She had to work as a bartender before she could overtly pursue her passion for arts and entertainment, Desingh recalls.
Today, transgenders bear the brunt of the stigma against those who identify across the LGBT spectrum, she claims. The suicide committed by a fellow transgender woman last month is just the tip of the iceberg. Anyway, the problem seems to have now assumed a different nuance compared to the past. “Simply put, we feel left behind and scrutinised,” claims Desingh. “Entering the industry is no longer the main problem, but staying and being engaged at work are. Employers may now understand that cultural values, skills and professionalism have nothing to do with ones’ sexual orientation or gender identification, thanks to awareness programs that contribute to the LGBT dialectic. Yet, it’s quite hard for the mainstream to understand and accept us.” “The thing with eradicating the stigma,” she urges, “is that people can’t clearly identify (and approach) us. If we want to shake things up, we need a greater push from media, government, NGOs, which all play a key role in shaping the public discourse.”
Breaking stereotypes
In an effort to promote a new narrative, Born2Win is offering a platform where trans-persons can showcase their talent and realise their latent potential in a variety of fields. The organisation’smission is to support educational and professional paths by turning a potential into a skill and encouraging the pursuit of high education to increase employability chances.
Swetha Sudhakar, a transgender woman who founded Born2Win in 2013, takes pride in speaking about the recent placement of fellow transgender person in a food startup. “In small companies of about 10 employees, employers are more open to welcoming in trans-persons because they are able to tackle potential problems as they arise.” Challenging stereotypes against transgender persons, however, remains a massive bet in the workplace. “Some of us internalise the stigma so much that when even a small issue occurs, we are not able to deal with it, and eventually drop out,” she says. “ This has to be changed. Both employers and colleagues need to understand and cooperate with each other,” she adds. The trust is also moving towards offering the transgender community vocational training in cooking, jewellery design and other activities.
“There’s still a long way to go until we reach full equality in the workplace, but recent stories of success and integration (Chennai welcomed its first transgender police officer in 2015, as well as a number of solo entrepreneurs engaged in successful businesses) suggest we may have found a way forward to slowly achieve this.”
This is first of a series on the LGBTQ community
(The article has been edited for an factual error)
