Life as I find it

Walking down the street near the old Ajmera School in Borivli West today, I came across this:

In case the picture isn’t clear, this is a dog drinking at a leaking water connection. Take a close look:

I couldn’t get a better picture. It got scared and ran away. Actually, when I saw it, there were two dogs drinking there, mouth to mouth. It actually was looking very pretty, like a pose for a photo. Unfortunately, the minute I showed even a little attention, this one got wary and the one plain ran away. So I had only one model to shoot.

I find a couple of things very disturbing about this. One is the attention given to leaking taps. In a country, rather world, where drinking water is an issue, this connection was leaking like a regular tap left on. I wonder how many of these are in Mumbai, and how much of the water crisis could be solved by simply getting them repaired. In an area that looks pretty parched from the summer, the gutter next to it had about 3-4 inches of water in it, which dried out about 5 meters or so, on both sides from the tap. Obviously this little oasis was from the tap.

The other thing I find disturbing is that a bunch of street dogs are drinking straight from the water connection that probably comes to my home too. How’s that for maintaining the purity of drinking water? Hardly anyone in Mumbai boils or filters drinking water, as it is generally very safe to drink. Could freak accident epidemics be happening from incidences like this?

If I make a complaint, I dare say a standard complacent reply will be issued with someone assuring me that it will be repaired – eventually – one fine day. If I speak about contamination and stuff, they will bring to my notice that water is flowing out, not into the system, so the chances of contamination are low. Government departments are well practiced in the art of deflecting anything that would mean actually taking prompt action. It is very comfortable to continue on auto pilot.

But I will still be making that complaint and following up on it personally till the problem is solved. It’s the least I can do about the water problems we are facing.

Also disturbing to me, is the fact that if I can walk around for half an hour almost anywhere in Mumbai, I’m likely to find a broken/damaged/leaking public tap, connection or pipe or similar. How much water we as a city are really wasting? WHY?

And the thing that gives me the creeps is that my home is quite far from any main water supply of the city. How many such “compromised” points lie between the purification unit and main tanks and the water that reached my tap? Should I really be drinking this water at all? And, in a developing country, with a reputation for most of the public not having access to drinking water, is the little public that is supposed to have it, also not really getting it?

How much quality can be added to existing water supply facilities simply by including careful maintenance and strict hygiene?

I hope anyone reading this makes it a point to promote awareness of this among people they know. We as a people can report every single point we find that wastes water and opens the main supply for contamination and insist on action.

Who in India hasn’t encountered these clapping, lewd “female” looking presumably males? Indian hijras are a right menace in most public areas, traffic signals, parks, even homes, if they catch wind of celebrations happening. What is this scene really? Who are these people?

Obviously, they are men, dressed as women, but what is behind that obvious first experience?

Eunuchs have traditionally been guardians of harems, in the times of kings, as I recall from some ancient books. So they seem to have existed for a long time. Many people believe blessings and curses from castrated hijras to be particularly potent, so that gives them a chance to make a living out on the streets in a glorified form of begging, peddling their good wishes and threatening with curses to get money from people passing. Others get together as a group with musical instruments and fancy clothes and perform song and dance routines at weddings and other auspicious occasions and earn slightly better. Still others work as prostitutes.

Until I had the fortune to meet some really interesting people among them, I really hadn’t spared them a thought beyond fury if they tried to get pushy with me. Then I met Geeta, and recently, Anjali and Sunita. I came to know the people behind these threatening personalities. They work toward bringing reform in the lives of the transgender community, as they like to refer to themselves with respect.

I learned about the difficulties their lives are faced with all the time. Particularly touching was once, when Noorie said that when in a rickshaw with a girl she preferred to be dropped home first, as if she got molested, no one would come to her help, and even the cops might molest her for complaining.

Another was when Sowmya spoke of the love she has for her sister and family that she is unable to express and be close with them, because society drives prejudices in the way. Aarti remembers being harassed even as a child, for being “delicate”.

This seems to be a common factor. Some times in their teenage years, they discovered that they weren’t really interested in girls as much as in boys, and identified with women better than with men. Acting on these impulses, and even becoming aware of them, simply intensified them, and they soon started seeming obviously “different”. Soon, there remained little choice but to leave their homes and join trans-gender communities and be among people like them, because others rarely would accept them.

In rare cases, their genitals are not “properly male” and in others, pursuing a profession like prostitution makes them undesirable. They are then castrated in some “home treatment” fashion, rarely in a hygienic manner, or with the benefit of anesthetic. The idea is to look as female as they can. Not all hijaras are castrated, though many are. This also creates other hormonal imbalances that they need medical help with. Few doctors are willing to entertain them.

Transgenders face a whole load of problems in their lives - from practical respect and acceptance problems, to finding accommodation and occupations beyond begging and prostitution. In a world where forms give you options of male and female, they have no box to tick. Ration cards and passports are problems. Claiming justice is a problem. Self-esteem and assertiveness is a problem for all their loud body language. Health care and AIDS is a huge problem. The bottom line is money and survival.

A touching look at the legal, social and religious aspects of being a hijra can be cound in this article

If we want less of “these hijras” harrassing us on the streets, we also need to be willing to be ok with them in other areas when they are working honestly. Who cares if a web designer is male or female or transgender? Or someone working in an office, or a reception person, or a tailor? It is silly inhibitions and a fear of the unknown that keeps us from even sparing them a second glance. We keep our distance with our contempt and hide our fear behind our aloof masks.

Some interesting means of employment and income are slowly creeping into public consciousness. Films employ transgenders to do their usual lewd routines, which earns them decent money, but is hated by many as an insensitive showcase of their plight, and reinforcing their image in the mainstream society as not particularly appealing individuals. Using their song and dance routines to collect over due taxes from defaulters follows the same lines, but firmly projects them as people working on the side of “the good” and seems to be getting interesting results as seen here. Perhaps, once we are able to see them as constructive workers, we might be able to offer them work beyond embarrassing people into paying money.

Luckily, there are organizations working with them. Some have even been started by educated transgender professionals to reach out to others like them. I suggest that we as people make that special effort not to cringe and turn away, but to deal with them as normally as we can, and see if we really like or dislike them, like we do with any other person. Not all of them are charming, and not all of them are bad. Can we look at the people more than their appearances?

*names changed to respect privacy

Edit: As routine maintenance of this site, I sometimes check to see what people are searching for, when they land up here. Many visitors from Europe land up here searching for conditions of this community, or information on what they are. The most popular search from India is “photo boy castrated India”. I find it sad that the leading interest in them is still morbid sexual curiosity. Very few searches from India actually have words that are asking about the people very few Indians really know. It is a long and uphill struggle.

I read the shocking plight of Jawahar Manjhi, a farm labourer in Bihar, working for 27 years to reply a loan of about 40 kg of rice for a family wedding. They agreed that he would work for a day for each kilo. Today, 27 years later, he has needed to borrow more rice, and is still working to repay his loan. The police are currently investigating this story, but if it turns out to be true, it will be another highlight on the huge economic and living conditions gap in the different social classes in India.

Bonded labour was banned in India in 1976 - some 30 years ago, but there have been few prosecutions of violators over the years. Anti Slavery International says that such exploitation is commonplace in India. And it is true isn’t it? Even Child Labour was taken strong action against last year, but how many people were actually caught? How many children were rescued? I have no clue. If anyone knows, I would welcome this information.

All I can see is that there are plenty of children still working on the streets - washing dishes on food stalls, selling newspapers, shining shoes, …….. So what has the law really done? It is not like isolated cases that the police miss. It was a huge thing for a couple of days, and then life was back to normal.

One shining incident I remember is the story of Palabakam in Tamil Nadu, a village of bonded slaves mostly belonging to the Irula tribe rescued from the rice mills in the year 2004 (I think). The government supported them after activists brought the matter right into their faces and made any other action an embarrassment. Otherwise, they had been happy to ignore the Irula plight and deny that there was any problem.

Somewhere down the line, I think it comes down to all of us as citizens to speak up on the things we see happening as they shouldn’t around us. If we can file reports of every child labourer on the streets that we see, there will be a time when the police will be answerable for the sheer number of reports piled up and their progress against them. This is something we should be making an effort about.

Female foeticide is a saddening problem in India. While many modern and educated families don’t really care about the sex of their children, rural families want boys. Girls are an unwelcome strain on the family finances for the dowry in their weddings, as well as incapable of physically standing up to the strain of labour intensive occupations like farming, which is the mainstay of India.

It is easy for us to sit in the cities and preach what should be, but to a poor, illiterate farmer (or stubborn orthodox family) it is the male child that matters. Whether it is for bringing in money as dowry, or staying in the home to care for parents in the old age, manage labour intensive occupations, carry on the family name, or just out of plain prejudice, but the fact remains that our words cannot change preferences of people.

It is extremely unethical to abort a child for being female. On the other hand, for a person without the understanding of ratios of males to females or even plain old fairness to their own progeny, it is something that is to be framed and worshipped, but not done.

I found the Indian government’s initiative toward adopting the unwanted girl children noteworthy. Here is something that can save some of those lives lost to orthodox preferences, but the one stumbling block in this that I see, is that very few people will be comfortable approaching someone to hand over their daughter and say that they don’t want her, even if it is true. This will be perceived as heartlessness, in a society where sin is not sin if it remains hidden from the world.

I read this article on how the ancient system of foundling wheels, where mothers could leave their babies in convents has been adopted by a hospital in Rome to help collect babies their mothers plan to abandon.

ROME, Feb. 27 — In the Middle Ages, new mothers in Rome could abandon their unwanted babies in a “foundling wheel” — a revolving wooden barrel lodged in a wall, often in a convent, that allowed women to deposit their offspring without being seen.

Now a Rome hospital, the Casilino Polyclinic, has introduced a technologically advanced version of the foundling wheel — not at all a wheel but very much like an A.T.M. booth. For the first time a new mother left her baby there on Saturday night, and on Monday the child, a boy about 3 months old, was doing well, said Dr. Piermichele Paolillo, who directs the neonatal unit at the hospital.

This is only a very small part of the article and I recommend all to read the whole thing.

This set me thinking. We have very strong plans in India to encourage adoption of female children to combat female foeticide. This would also enable parents who later had a change of heart to reclaim their daughters. A truly inspiring initiative. The government plans to adopt these girls in order to give them a life.

I remember thinking when this was announced about who would openly give up their girl children to orphanages. Surely, this itself would mean a social stigma, and the foeticide would only marginally be affected.

Could this system from ancient Rome be put to good use in this programme in India?

It would have several benifits. The anonimity would encourage people to use the facility without fearing social criticism, saving the lives of many unborn girls. The government would probably find larger support of its adoption scheme from rural organizations and people. The girls would get a life, rather than an abortion for fear of being saddled with a female child.

It would become far more easy to crack down on providers of illegal abortions, and providers who may be doing so under local pressure/demand would be able to advise their clients of this more acceptable alternative.

Based on records of dates of the child being left and DNA tests, parents who change their mind and want to claim their daughters would still be able to identify them.

I suspect, though I may be wrong, that the refusal of sex determination tests, with this option as the plan of action would allow the family to form an emotional bond with the unborn child rather than thinking of it as genetic currency, and perhaps, just perhaps, they would love her even after she was born, and would not want her to grow up an orphan.

This is not so well written, so if anyone feels they could put it better, please feel free to suggest changes. I think this is an important issue in India.

This is the very first post on this site. I am proud to have finally created this place as a platform for interaction for all sorts of Indians on the subject of their motherland. I’d been thinking about this for a very long time, but somehow always found the project to be too daunting, too huge to take up on my own.

India is a vast place. The sheer diversity of India is perhaps beyond comprehension of a single individual, yet, we are all Indians. Our interests vary, our habits, beliefs, concerns……. they are all different. Yet, we are all Indians and what happens in our motherland happens to us as well, in varying degrees.

Today, India is going good. Our economy is booming, we’re the country with the most number of billionaires in Asia after overtaking Japan. All sorts of industries are flourishing. There is improved satisfaction with life and better hopes for futures.

Yet, the diversity of the Indian society is not only cultural. We have the richest, and we also have the embarrassingly poor. Our educated professionals are respected worldwide for their knowledge, and we are also struggling with illiteracy. We even have the film industry that churns out a phenomenal number of films a year and our population is largely rural.

As we zip into progress, I think a need of the time is to reach out. To reach out to people of all sorts. I don’t only mean the lesser previledged or anything, just to reach out and understand the different people who are with us in this journey, to broaden our own horizons through the diversity of India.

At the moment, I am not very clear on where this initiative will go in the future. I guess, it is like India in this way too. The potential is tremendous, what remains to be seen is how much effort is taken.

I wish myself and all the people here the very best and hope that this site will be able to bring in new thoughts, initiatives and hopes.