The Hijra at Cross Roads
June 14, 2008 · Leave a Comment
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Hijra
The best sources of information on the hijra that I know of are the books The Invisibles and Neither Man Nor Woman. I have not yet read either of these in their entirety yet.
The hijra (an Urdu word) are shrouded in secrecy. They live apart from the rest of society, appearing only as performers, priest/esses, and beggars. It is difficult to find out details of their personal lives, such as whether they were castrated voluntarily and what their gender identification is. Most of them seem to have an intermediate gender identity that leans strongly feminine. Many of them seem to have an identity that closely parallels what we would call, in the U.S., a male-to-female transsexual–with the notable exception that U.S. transsexuals do not typically live and work in groups and are not, in principle, restricted to employment as entertainers. Where my country requires all people to belong to one of two sexes, thus encouraging transsexuals to make a full gender transition, assimilate, and blend in, in India there is a third sex category to which the hijra belong. An effeminate or castrated Indian male is placed in this category whether s/he wishes to be third sex or not.
An employment agency is starting up in India to help the hijra find jobs and to provide unemployment checks. There is a national organization called Treetiya Panthi Sanghatana (TPS) which was founded in the 1990s and has 10,000 members. The current president is Kajal Nayak. (Week-long eunuch meet at A’nagar,” PUNE Newsline, India, April 8, 2003. cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=48793)
I was once contacted by someone who sought information on the hijra’s goddess Bahuchara Mata. I unfortunately was unable to help him. Several years later, in 2003, I was startled to find a reference to the elusive goddess in Elizabeth Abbott’s A History of Celibacy. As the story goes, a woman named Bahuchara was threatened by rapists in the forest of Gujarat. She cut off her breast and offered it to them if they would not touch her. She then died and was deified as an earth goddess. Bahuchara Mata appears to impotent men, commanding them to chop off their genitals and become their servant. If they do not, they will be impotent for their next seven incarnations. Before the castration, an hijra “midwife” (dai ma) may slice a coconut to see if she ought to proceed. If Bahuchara Mata wills the castration to happen, the coconut halves will separate cleanly. An hijra repeats Bahuchara Mata’s name–mata, mata, mata–as a mantra during her castration. The castration process, incidentally, is called nirvan, meaning “a total calmness devoid of desire.” The hijra is allowed to bleed to purify herself of the male element. The healing process is seen as a battle between Bahuchara Mata, the life-giver, and her sister Chamundeswari, the destroyer. (1)
A reader of my webpage told me this:
Most hijras trace their orgin from the Indian epic the Mahabharata. In it, the great warrior Arjuna must undergo a disguise to hide himself for a year. He dresses as a woman because he thinks this polar opposite of his warrior status will best conceal his heightened masculinity. While he is in drag for a year, he is a dance instructor in the king’s court, and he also sings at weddings.
The Ramayana, a Sanskrit epic poem, was written between 200 BCE-200 CE. Jaffrey heard a legend that the hero, Ram, ordered the “men and women” who were following him to turn back, and the hijras, identifying neither as men nor women, did not turn back. The hijras remained and waited fourteen years for Ram. Upon returning, Ram blessed them. However, when Jaffrey looked up the passage for herself, she found no mention of the hijras. In another case, she heard that Arjun, in the Mahabharata, became an hijra for one year after he refused a goddess. When she looked it up for herself, she was uncertain about the meaning of the passage. She explains:
The well-regarded van Buitenen translation described Arjun this way, through the eyes of King Virat: “A handsome man, completely endowed/A swarthy youth like an elephant leader/ Who is wearing bright conches set into gold/And sporting a braid and a pair of earrings.” This depiction of his hair and earrings, but not his dress, makes Arjun appear effeminate. “No man of your stature resembles a eunuch,” says King Virat, “in any which way, it seems to me!” Arjun replies: “I sing and dance and make fine music/I am good at the dance and a master of song. …/The reason I have this form–what profit/Is there in recounting it but great pain?/Brhannada, sire, is my name, deserted by mother and father as son and daughter.” The king has him examined and finds him “not a man.” But the name Brhannada, writes von Buitenen, is a feminine word meaning “having a large reed;” thus it is a joke–Arjun being “well endowed,” though seeming effeminate. The Indian scholar Pratap Chandra Roy translated Arjun’s state this way: The women of the court examined him and found that “his impotency was of a permanent nature.” The word for “eunuch” used in this context is the Sanskrit “prakrti,” apparently meaning a “neuter,” “bereft of either a masculine or feminine nature.” The two authors suggest, therefore, that Arjun was not a castrated being, but came in the guise of a natural-born eunuch. (2)
(1) Abbott 329. See also Eunuchs in history and society, Vern L. Bullough (University of Southern California). in Tougher, Shaun, ed. Eunuchs in Antiquity and Beyond. The Classical Press of Wales and Duckworth, 2002. p 3.
(2) Jaffrey 83-4. See also 29, 32.
News stories about the hijra:
In 2000, Kamla Jaan, age fifty-two, was elected mayor of Katni in Central India. She was India’s first transgendered mayor, and although illiterate, has been a powerful force supporting Katni’s poor. There are at least 1 million hijras in India (an hijra is nearly analogous to the Western concept of a male-to-female transsexual who identifies and presents as a woman, but are simultaneously perceived as members of a “third sex”). Most have traditional occupations of singers, priestesses, or prostitutes, but increasingly they have seen political success, in part because Indian voters support hijras as a way of rebelling against the establishment, and because hijras are perceived as being less interested in personal gain than men and women with family ties. Katni’s mayoral seat was reserved for a woman, and Kamla Jaan successfully argued that she was qualified to take it–because, unlike the third-sex hijra, she was born, not made, a eunuch. The candidates who Kamla Jaan defeated in 2000 filed a lawsuit that claimed that the regional election official should not have allowed her to run for a woman’s seat. “Everyone knows that a eunuch is more close to a man than a woman,” says Alka Jain, the defeated BJP candidate. Kamla Jaan’s older legal documents identified her as a male. In 2002, a judge in the central state of Madhya Pradesh ruled that she was indeed male and therefore disqualified. On February 3, 2003, the High Court of Madhya Pradesh state ruled that Kamla Jaan could not become mayor of Katni because the post was reserved for women, thereby indirectly ruling that eunuchs are male. Jaan plans to appeal to India’s Supreme Court; meanwhile, the town will hold another election. (Boston Globe, 2/5 or 2/6/03)
Also in Madhya Pradesh, “Former actress Shabnam Mausi, known as Aunt Shabnam, became the first eunuch elected to India’s Legislative Assembly – and even launched a national eunuchs’ political party.” (Boston Globe, 2/23/03)
26-year-old Imran Ajmeri, running as an Independent challenger for Congress in Ahmedabad in 2002, says, “Muslims consider me one of their community. For Hindus, I am a revered mataji. Besides, people are sick of all mooch (the moustachioed) and chotli (women) candidates.” He is popular with the Muslims, Dalits, and Hindus, and is endorsed by Mohammad Husain “Mummy” of the newly-launched National Minority Party.
“A eunuch joins the bandwagon.” Radha Sharma. The Times of India. November 28, 2002. timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articlesh… TinyURL: tinyurl.com/333q
A 10-member committee will formally request India’s government to help provide more employment opportunities for eunuchs. “We are sexually handicapped and should be treated like any other physically handicapped person,” said Renee Kapoor of the All India Eunuch Conference in Varanasi, which was attended by 5,000 eunuchs. The goddess Durga was worshipped at the event. “India’s eunuchs demand more access to universities.”
The hijra in New Delhi are collecting complaints from telephone service subscribers. Reportedly, the hijra siege the telephone companies and threaten to expose themselves if they are not heard. An organizer with the first name of Jameelajaan told the Hindustan Times: “We have less polite ways of dealing with those who wish to fob us off.” Deputy Commisioner of Police U K Katna said: “In our country everyone is free to protest verbally or stage a sit-in. Eunuchs are no different. As long as there’s no damage to property, physical assault or disruption of work, they can take whatever action they feel necessary.”
“Eunuchs take up role of consumer champions,” Ananova Ltd., February 08, 2003, www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_748738.html
Eunuchs gathered in Jalandhar on February 27, 2003, for a funeral celebration for their community member Janaki. “Celebration, yes. This is the spirit because we see death as liberation from the curse of having been born a eunuch,” said Shobha, president of the North Zone Eunuch’s Association. “In Hindi films our image is not properly projected. We are painted in a distorted manner. We are victims of a very backward kind of racism, worst even than castism. We are not handicapped. We can think normally and work as much as many human being. It is nature that gave as this birth. Anyone can be born a eunuch, then why are we discriminated against. Just like men and women we should be treated as a third category.” The group made a political statement that eunuchs should be allowed to be involved in politics. “We have already entered the political arena on own without the basis of caste or religion from a number of states. Even in Punjab three of our community had successfully contested municipal elections and were fairly popular among the public.” The author of the article says that “in Punjab there are almost 2000 deras of eunuchs and a total population of over 40,000.” Shobha said, “People bring to us children who are born eunuchs in families who ostracise them. We even adopt healthy non-eunuch orphans and get them married only to experience the joy of parenthood. Let it be clear that a large number of normal people are these days giving a bad name to our community by begging in trains. They try to copy our dress style and mannerisms.”
“Eunuchs seek quota in politics.” PTI (India). Feb. 28, 2003. www.tribuneindia.com/2003/20030228/punjab1.htm#12
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Categories: Begging Hijdas of Mumbai
