the third sex

I approach the group of hijras. The first thing that strikes me is their hostility. Is the humiliation and ridicule faced by them the reason for this aggression? “Why have you come here? Tamasha dekhne?” they ask me. What is this tamasha that will change a mother’s fate forever, I wonder.

Nevertheless, I ask them why they are interested in Malini’s baby. Maya, a 55-year-old hijra, replies, “So that we can rear him the way we want to. We will bring him here as your society will not accept him as a hijra. Even if he’s not brought here today, one day he himself will come to us. Your society doesn’t recognise us and will not recognise him as well.”

But what about the child’s education? “Education? When we can’t afford to feed ourselves, where’s the question of education? Who will teach us? We know how to write our name, and that’s more than enough for us.”

It’s lunch-time and the eunuchs shut their doors on us. “You go now. We will not say anything more,” Maya says.

As I turn to leave, a pair of sad eyes, peeping through a half-broken window, catch my attention. It turns out to be a 20-year-old eunuch, with a robust voice. He starts talking to me... “I came here when I was five years old. My original home is somewhere in Tollygunj. My parents are really poor and they couldn’t keep me with them, So didi (Maya) took custody of me.

Had I stayed back with my parents, I would have been someone like you. People would have respected me, would have spoken to me like a normal human being. I’m requesting you not to send that child here. Use mat bhejo,” he pleads. With tears rolling down his cheeks, he continues, “What will the baby get here? We don’t even get proper meals everyday. People hate us. We don’t know how to read and write. How will we feed another mouth? Maya didi wants to bring the baby here and is planning to take money from the parents as well,” he whispers.

Shaken by this revelation, I decide to approach Maya again. Very reluctantly, he opens the door. Are you really going to take money from Sreya’s parents, is my direct question. Without the slightest hesitation, Maya says, “Yes, I am. We are poor and can’t afford to bring up the baby the way you people do.”

- Malini Das gave birth to a hermaphrodite. She wants to bring up her child normally, but the eunuch community is bent upon bringing a new entrant into its fold.

[article taken from The Times of India, Sunday Review dated 9th July, 2006. Photo also taken from the same source]