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| Vol. 4, Issue 5 May 2012 |
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Reporting & Essays |
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Reportage |
The Brides of Aravan
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| The struggle for third-gender recognition in Tamil Nadu has achieved surprising success despite the area’s conservative reputation |
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TOM PIETRASIK FOR THE CARAVAN |
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| An aravani getting ‘married’ to Lord Krishna.
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HE DIMLY LIT CORRIDORS of the Arcot Hotel are rank with the smell of sweat, cigarettes and stale beer. The hallways ring with loud chatter, raucous laughter and the occasional scream. The summer heat is sweltering. Half-open doors reveal grungy rooms crowded with large women in various stages of undress. Pink petticoats, padded bras, hair |
extensions, sequined saris, miniskirts—some on, some off. Out in the passageways, a few men hang about, hungrily eyeing the women who stride out of the rooms. One grabs at Kalki as she walks past, dressed in a modest salwaar-kameez, her glossy hair pulled back in a ponytail. She turns and speaks to him softly before she gently extricates herself and moves on. The man suddenly seems reduced, almost bashful. The hunter looks hunted. But this isn’t surprising. For Kalki Subramaniam isn’t quite who she seems. Out here, all definitions, all identities, are fluid. The only certainty is that in this packed hotel I’m the only naturally born woman. The rest are aravanis, kothis and panthis (transgenders, feminine homosexuals and their seemingly straight male clients).
The Arcot sits on PJN Road, just off National Highway 45 in Villupuram—a dusty town in Tamil Nadu about a three-and-a-half-hour drive from Chennai. Though it’s an important trading centre for agricultural goods like paddy, groundnut, sugarcane and coconut, on most days Villupuram is just another sleepy Indian town. But tonight is the night before the annual Koovagam village temple festival, where thousands of aravanis from across south and central India have gathered for the celebrations. Despite the nearly unbearable heat, the town pulses with activity. Hotels are packed, alcohol flows freely at local bars and large crowds descend on transgender beauty pageants hosted by an aravani rights group.
“This is basically a weeklong sex-fest,” explains Kalki, who identifies herself as a ‘transwoman.’ We’re shooed out of our spot on the tiny hotel room veranda by an aravani dragging an eager young man along with her, so we sit indoors with four other aravanis—all Kalki’s friends—while the two get it on outside. Apart from me, no one seems discomfited. For most aravanis, sex is work. It’s about money and putting food on the table. There’s no embarrassment attached to it. And on this particular occasion, sex ties in neatly with Koovagam festival lore.
The presiding deity of the temple at Koovagam, a tiny village about 30 kilometres outside Villupuram, is Aravan. In the Mahabharata it was prophesised that the Pandavas would win the battle of Kurukshetra only if they sacrificed a ‘perfect’ male from among themselves. Aravan, the virgin son of Pandav prince Arjuna, offered himself up for sacrifice. But he had a request: that he be allowed to spend one night as a married man. No king was willing to give his daughter in marriage only to have her widowed the next day, so finally, Lord Krishna assumed female form and married Aravan, and after a night of sexual bliss, Aravan was beheaded.
Every year, during the first full moon of the Tamil month of Chittirai (April- May) aravanis converge at Koovagam to commemorate this ancient narrative. The transgenders of Tamil Nadu identify themselves with the female form Krishna assumed for his night with Aravan. Hence they call themselves aravanis—wives of Aravan (as opposed to hijras, the term common to the rest of India).
At the temple grounds, thousands of visiting aravanis (as well as young men from around the region for whom Aravan is a family deity) act out the role of Aravan’s bride. Dressed in their best saris they line up outside the temple carrying offerings of camphor, coconuts and bananas in small plastic baskets. Inside, amid a breathless crush of jostling bodies, clanging bells and the overpowering smell of the burning camphor, the priests tie turmeric-coated sacred marital threads around the aravanis’ necks and allow them a splitsecond audience with the idol of Aravan.
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Kalki, a transsexual, has been advocating for transsexual rights for over a decade. |
Later, the aravanis celebrate their ‘wedding night’ through countless acts of sex with panthis—something more than just clients this night—in the fields and groves around the village temple. All through the night shadowy figures disappear and emerge from behind trees and bushes. (Kalki later dreamily described how she had a “wonderful time” in a coconut grove with “two handsome young sons of a farmer.”) As dawn breaks, the aravanis emerge to mourn the inevitable death of their mythical husband. A giant, garland-laden effigy of Aravan is pulled through the narrow village streets before being ceremonially beheaded and set to flames. The aravanis then don widow’s weeds, break their bangles and grieve with an intense—albeit rather contrived—passion.
The Koovagam festival serves to validate the aravanis’ place within a traditional social structure. It’s a place this sexual minority has long been struggling to carve out for itself by appropriating local rituals, folklore and legends in different parts of the world. Over the years, however, the festival has also morphed into a unique space for transgenders in southern India to bond, share experiences, and coordinate their campaign for recognition. In the process, they also manage a bit of guilt-free debauchery.
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NDIA'S TRANSGENDER COMMUNITY has more than 4,000 years of recorded history. As per Hindu mythology, hijras represent the half-male, half-female image of Shiva—an image symbolic of a being that is ageless and sexless. The hijras’ third sex dimension is said to infuse them with ‘Shiva shakti’ (the power of Shiva) and give them supernatural powers to |
bless or curse.
Mythological associations aside, hijras have always been a fringe group in Hindu society; feared and hated for their gender bending and sexual non-conformity far more than they are revered for any Shiva shakti. Segregated and excluded from most occupations, they often turn to begging and sex work to earn a living. It’s an existence fraught with danger; they are often victimised and degraded by both clients and the police. Indeed, the Indian transgenders’ struggle for day-to-day survival often trumps their fight for basic human rights.
But this has been changing in recent years. And nowhere is it more evident than among the aravanis of Tamil Nadu. In 2009, the Tamil Nadu state government began providing free sex-change surgery, the only administration to do so outside Cuba and Brazil. The same government recently established a transgender welfare board for its estimated 80,000-strong aravani community that offers special third-gender ration cards, passports and reserved seats in government-run educational institutions. Priya Babu, one of ten transgenders on the Aravani Welfare Board and a respected social worker, talks of a state-wide transgender census that should be “completed soon.”
In the social sphere, too, the state has taken bold steps where others have hesitated. In December, Chennai hosted India’s first-ever nationwide transgender beauty pageant, drawing 120 contestants from across the country, paving the way for the January launch of ‘Indian Super Queen 2010’—a talent hunt contest with a one million rupee cash prize that culminated in a spectacular finale in Mumbai on 21 February. Back in 2008, Chennai was launching ground for both Ippudikku Rose, a Tamil tv talk show fronted by a transgender—another first in India—and the release of a mainstream Tamil film, Karuvarai Pookal, starring an aravani.
“Earlier there was 100 percent discrimination and torture of the community, also a lot of violent behaviour,” explains Geetha Amma, a senior aravani who’s lived in Chennai for over two decades. “Now there’s a lot of awareness so 80 percent less aggression,” she estimates. “Public discrimination has come down by 60 percent.”
What could have led to such major liberalisation in a typically conservative state? Simple answer: AIDS.
India’s first HIV-positive cases were diagnosed among Chennai’s female sex workers in 1986. This resulted in a deluge of state and privately funded intervention programmes aimed at Tamil Nadu’s sex workers and sexual minority groups. Aravanis, who turned out to be the most vulnerable sub-group among sexual minorities, received special attention from these programmes. AIDS awareness forums provided aravanis with a platform to speak out on issues that impact their lives.
“Why the aravanis of Tamil Nadu feel more empowered, is because they have been included in these HIV intervention programmes for over 23 years,” says Supriya Sahu, former project director of the Tamil Nadu State Aids Control Society (TNSACS), “whereas in many other states these programmes have only just begun.” A petite, no-nonsense administrator, Sahu was with TNSACS from 2006 to 2008, and is still popular among aravanis for her sustained advocacy work. Her most successful campaign sensitised the state police force to the rights of sexual minorities.
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An aravani adjusts her sari prior to a locally organised beauty pageant. |
“When I joined TNSACS, many aravanis and MSMs (‘men who have sex with men,’ ie, homosexuals and bisexuals) would complain about police harassment,” Sahu says. “So we launched a massive programme involving transgenders, MSMs, sex workers and HIV-positive people and the police. This was crucial because usually the aravanis’ first point of contact with the State is the police.”
Seven thousand police personnel were trained over a one-year period, starting from the deputy inspector general to officials at local precincts. Sexual minority members conducted classes that focused on dispelling the myth that gender non-conformity was unnatural. They also stressed aravanis should be treated with dignity.
“It’s changed the relationship between cops and aravanis,” Sahu says. “Now many aravanis call me to say that these days they can walk into a police station and file a complaint!”
Government support aside, Tamil Nadu’s aravanis are fighting for mainstream acceptance with a gusto unmatched by hijras in other parts of India, says Sunil Menon, a flamboyant gay-rights activist who promotes safe sex among Chennai’s MSM community. “They have gone from place to place, they have picketed, they have campaigned. The transgender group here has been visible and proactive. They have made things work. They aren’t just sitting waiting for things to happen. That’s why I’m so proud of them.”
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HE OFFICE OF THE Social Welfare Association for Men (SWAM) stands on a narrow street near Saidapet station in Chennai. The shabby, two-storey building with a spacious concrete courtyard and three adjacent shed-like rooms serves as a drop-in centre for local gays, lesbians, transgenders and HIV-positive persons. It’s a space where they can get |
medical advice, food, counselling and spend a few hours relaxing in a non-judgmental environment. When I meet up with Kalki here a day after the Koovagam festival, she’s lying on a straw mat in the courtyard, heads together with five other aravanis, playfully singing in Tamil; her outstretched arms holding above her head a laptop with an inbuilt webcam, recording their song.
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An aravani leaving a bar in Villupuram. Many clients of transexual prostitutes frequent such establishments. |
A dark-skinned, elegant beauty, Kalki embodies the changing face of the Tamil Nadu transgenders. This softspoken aravani has carved out for herself a life and livelihood that transcends her transgender identity. She holds a Masters degree in journalism and mass communication and works as an independent media specialist developing web-based projects for clients. A well-known figure in the Chennai queer circles, Kalki runs the Sahodari (‘friend’ in Tamil) Foundation, a web-based outfit campaigning for transgender civil and legal rights. She often travels around the country giving talks in schools and colleges on gendervariant people and writes about her experiences as an activist on her personal blog: kalki.tblog.com.
Her latest enterprise is a matrimonial website for transsexual women, Thirunangai.net. Probably the first of its kind, the portal lists profiles of transwomen in search of life partners. “We are getting a lot of attention. Men are writing to us from all over, Malaysia, Singapore, Sweden…,” says Kalki. Thirunangai, incidentally, means ‘respectable woman’ in Tamil. Though no marriages have been fixed so far, Kalki is optimistic. “More than anything, the idea is to raise the issues of marriage and adoption rights for aravanis,” she says. She intends to expand the site into a transgender resource portal that would include information on jobs, health, government welfare schemes and current news. On the professional side, Kalki is working towards a second Masters degree in international relations. She envisions herself working with UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) someday, as India’s cultural ambassador.
In essence, what sets Kalki apart from many aravanis is how absolutely comfortable she is in her own skin. Given the usual in-your-face, aggressive approach of most aravanis, Kalki’s quiet self-assuredness comes as a bit of a surprise. But then again, she’s had the privilege of a (reluctantly) supportive family and higher education—both rare luxuries among her more impoverished aravani sisters.
Though she grew up in a well-heeled businessman’s family in Coimbatore, Kalki’s as comfortable in the hardscrabble world of destitute aravanis as in the rarefied air of university lecture halls.
“I’ve been connected with the community since I was 13, so I know how it works,” she says. “I know why there is so much aggression, why they beg, sell sex…everything.”
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A significant portion of an aravani’s income comes from prostitution, often solicited around truck stops. |
She was only eight when she began noticing that she wasn’t like other boys. “I was very effeminate,” she recalls. “I liked doing things girls did. I loved flowers, the colours pink and lavender, and glittery dresses. I bought my first lipstick when I was ten, a bright red Lakmé shade for 24 rupees. By the time I was 13 there was so much harassment at school that I started bunking and spending all my time at a park that used to be frequented by aravanis. That’s where I met my first guru. Soon I began to go out with them publicly, for movies, tea, etc. One day, my father’s friend spotted me with them. There was a big showdown at home that evening. My father thought I was having sex with them. So I had to come out and tell the truth.”
Kalki underwent sexual reorientation surgery in 2006 and remains under hormone therapy and laser treatment to reduce facial and chest hair—an expensive procedure increasingly popular among aravanis. She’s proud of her developing breasts, another outcome of hormone injections. “You want to see?” She pulls up her shirt to reveal one budding breast without waiting for a response. “My family isn’t very happy with the situation, but they accept it. After so many years only last year my sisters gave me gold studs and saris as gifts.”
“I was the only son in the family,” she laughs self-deprecatingly, “now I’m one of three daughters.” | | | |
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Readers' Comments |
Total Comments
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Puthi
18 April 2012
12:39 PM
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Hi Kalki,
Indeed it is a great job you are doing. May be you are born for this noble assignment of bringing under privleged community to the main stream of our Nation - All the best for your all projects , May God Bless You.
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baskar
7 April 2012
09:48 PM
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Hi kalki wonderful job god bless u.
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mastro
8 January 2012
01:40 PM
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u done a great job................................................god bless u
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deepak
14 December 2011
01:13 PM
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Kalki u hve done really gr8 job really proud of u keep goin on
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gsharavanan
17 November 2011
12:51 PM
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i like
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mohan
8 November 2011
03:33 PM
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gud bless you
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rishidas
15 September 2011
02:41 PM
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kalki good bless you
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chaithanya
15 September 2011
04:27 AM
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hi kalki ur doing a great stufff but i cant see the pics in the marriage beureu of ur site tht was coming 404 erroe if u rectify my problem thn i will see the photos and pick my lovely one ok
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kumar
10 December 2010
06:39 PM
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Hi Kalki ...Really your great wish you goog luck
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santosh
12 November 2010
09:49 AM
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hi kalki.
great job
well done.
keep inspiring the people.
wish you good luck and success
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Mrin
24 April 2010
01:44 AM
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Great stuff! I was expecting some more photos though. I hope there's a follow-up on the families of transgenders and how the rest of the country is addressing the concerns of transgenders.
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