UNMASKING INEQUALITY: A CROSSROADS OF TRANSGENDER STRUGGLES IN INDIA AND AMERICA - SOCIAL, ECONOMIC, AND POLITICAL DISCRIMINATION EXPLORED (original) (raw)
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Transgenders Community in India Socioeconomic Health and Psychological Conditions
Journal of Research in Social Science and Humanities, 2023
The transgender community in India has historically been marginalised and discriminated against socially, economically, and politically. Many people view trans people as abnormal or deviant, and they frequently experience abuse and violence on both a physical and emotional level, including sexual assault. Many incidents go unreported due to fear of retribution or a lack of legal recognition. Education is often the primary barrier for transgender individuals, with many dropping out of school due to bullying and a lack of support. Employment is often tricky, with many forced into low-paying jobs or engaging in sex work. Healthcare access is also challenging, with hormone therapy, gender-affirming surgeries, and mental health support often not easily accessible. This paper examined the demographic, socioeconomic, employment, health, psychological conditions, and transgender people's rights protection acts in India.
Journal of Human Rights Practice, 2022
The amendments to the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act of India in 2019 address non-binary persons’ constitutional rights, recognition of their gender identity, and non-discrimination laws across institutional spaces (for example, family, workplace, education, and healthcare). The Act discusses legal rights in isolation of praxis, structural support and, more importantly, lacks guidelines needed to substantively access rights. Such a disconnection relegates human rights to merely legal changes with limited practice. In this article, we discuss the achievements and failures of the act from the perspective of a transgender community in India, and the impact it has had on their lives from its formulation in 2014. Although non-binary communities are recognized, they face severe abuse and discrimination. We analyse accounts of 15 transgender persons’ lived experiences and challenges they faced in claiming their rights in Kolkata, a metropolis in eastern India. We used the framework of substantive access to rights, that is, the actual ability to practice and access documented rights, to critically discuss our findings across family, work, education, and healthcare spaces, often showing the gaps between achieved legal status, and the practical realities on the ground. We provide several recommendations to bridge these gaps—improving educational equity for non-binary people, including transgender specific training for healthcare providers and, more importantly, increasing the adequate representation of non-binary people in the positions of negotiation. The road to claiming social and economic rights following legal rights for non-binary gender communities cannot be achieved without overcoming their erasure within families and hypervisibility in public spaces.
TRANSGENDER IN INDIAN CONTEXT: RIGHTS AND ACTIVISM
AABS Publishing House, Kolkata, India, 2019
The anthology Transgender in Indian Context: Rights and Activism is written as a plea for transgender community in India neglected and deprived for long. The anthology with an effort to touch the soft corner of Indian hearts for this invisible class, tries to lay bare almost all those factors which are responsible to stigmatise their life and show almost all requisites through which this community so long denied to social positioning can meet dignified life on both familial and sociatal surface. The anthology has covered twenty well-explored articles on this serious issue which is the need of the day. Some of the articles in this anthology dealing with popular transgender autobiographies have endeavoured to explore the real life experience of transgender community in India showing their hard struggle to come into societal surface from their hidden marginal existence. Authors are very deep and sincere to articulate their ideas and hopefully see the service of humanity though their esteemed works in this anthology.
Frontiers in Political Science, 2022
Transgender groups in India constitute an indigenous community with a rich and vivid culture and history. However, it is unfortunate that under the hegemonic influence of heteronormative traditions, the democratic inclusion and accommodation of transgender groups could never take place. This exclusion and neglect have recently been challenged through the activism of several groups, which has given rise to a new chapter in the democratic unfolding in India. This article attempts to evaluate the social activism of transgender groups on two planes. One plane attempts to evaluate it in terms of the uniqueness of an indigenous social movement and the areas that distinguish it from other social movements. It is interesting to note that what started as a purely identity-based social movement has now acquired dimensions of redistributive justice. The second plane attempts to evaluate the social activism of transgender groups in terms of the achievements and advances made by the movement on the social and political fronts. This evaluation is necessary in order to appraise the trajectory of the politics of transgender groups, which could foretell the direction of the activism and help in understanding the future scope and direction. The article takes up three arguments in the context of the legal framework put in effect by the state. The first point of discussion is the effectiveness of the transgender ID provided by the Transgender Persons Act and the possible challenges and loopholes related to it. While the state provides legal recognition through the issuance of the transgender ID card, it only remains a symbolic marker as the de facto identity remains unchanged, unless changed by the person themselves. The second point of discussion is the emerging rift amongst transgender groups with respect to the reforms introduced recently. This rift has a tendency to pull in the opposite direction, causing tensions. The final aspect of my discussion relates to the subsequent challenges that emerge from the legal recognition of transgender persons. These challenges touch upon the various aspects of legal, political, social, and economic policymaking and are inevitable for understanding the concerns of transgender persons in India.
Archers & Elevators Publishing House Bangalore – 560 090 India, 2021
Discrimination against gender is a pervasive and long running phenomenon that characterizes Indian society at every level. Our society has naturalized the binary of male and female to a large extend that it has forgotten to acknowledge the sexual diversity that exists. Transgender is one of the gender identities that do not match with ones assigned sex at birth. They are known by different names such as hijras (eunuch), kinnar, aravani, kothi, shiv-shakti, etc in India. They have been occupying a large number of populations but still experiencing different obstacles in their day to day life. Due to social stigma, economic insufficiency, transphobia, etc. they are not able to participate in different aspects of our society including political life like the other two genders. An attempt has been made in this paper to highlight some of the barriers that come in the path of their political participation in India. Despite these entire negative stereotypes they are trying to take active participation in political activities. This paper also intends to showcase some possible proposals to increase the level of political participation of the transgender in India.
PROTECTING HUMAN RIGHTS OF TRANSGENDER PERSONS IN INDIA: AN OVERVIEW AND CRITICAL APPRAISAL
SHODH SARITA JOURNAL OF ARTS, HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES, 2020
While discussing the rights of transgender, we must also discuss the obligations of the state, community, and the individual. One question that arises in one's mind, is, should the transgender people live with stigmatisation? Religion attaches importance that the transgender people should live their normal life, it also makes it clear that determination of gender is on God and part of the journey on the planet. The final decision of the gender is on God. The quality of life is equal with everyone, if not more important than the life of normal people. This article discusses the definition of transgender prevalence and status of transgender in India, rights of transgender Act, the transgender persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019, key issues that transgender people face, and discrimination and harassment and rights of God. Certain recommendations have been offered for the transgender people, how they can be economically independent and live in a more dignified manner.
TRANSGENDER ACCEPTANCE IN INDIA: DISTANCE TRAVELLED AND WAY AHEAD
In the recent times one may witness greater acceptance towards transgender in India as compared a decade ago, courtesy social protests, agitations, various legal judgements and greater developments in the views of people towards this community. As a result of these today we witness greater acceptance towards transgender and their rights and problems in the Indian Society, however the legal status of transgender is even better in many western countries. In India the social workers of have somewhat succeeded in addressing the rights of this community alongside the reasons for exclusion. This paper argues that still there is a long way to bring actual development and equality to transgender community and it definitely needs some thoughtful, insightful and influential intervention in identifying the problems so as to bring the transgender people of each corner of India at a same pedestal.
Problems of Transgenders in India
Transgender community in India is an important part of society. Even, law can't deny their existence. We live in 21 st century where human rights are assured and preserved for human beings except the third gender i.e.., Transgender. Despite all constitutional guarantees, the Transgender are even denied to have their basic rights like Right to Dignity, Personal Liberty, Education, Freedom of expression etc. The present research paper deals with the problems, Transgender face in a developing country like India. The study also covers how the presence of Transgender is excluded from the society and what the law and order is doing to convert that social exclusion into social inclusion.