How lockdowns forced Kashmir’s transgenders into a life sans dignity

As the sun sets in Srinagar, Muskan, a 26-year-old trans-woman, comes out of her rented accommodation and waits on the streets for clients. Before what she calls “the brutal transition of August 5, 2019”, Muskan used to “counsel and try to mainstream” some trans-persons engaged in sex work.

“And now, here I am, doing the same!” she says.

It wasn’t easy for Muskan to open up with this journalist. After a lot of reluctance and cancelling a few interviews, she agreed to meet at a popular walk-way bridge on river Jhelum—the Zero Bridge.

“Zero is the summary of my life as well,” she declares, piteously.

Admitting to a familiar tragic tale of secrecy and stigma in her society and surroundings, Muskan now fears boycott even from her own community for engaging in sex work for livelihood.

Before August 5, 2019, when the special status to Jammu and Kashmir was revoked and a lockdown was imposed on the new Union Territory, Muskan and most other trans-persons were engaged in singing and dancing at weddings. Many would also do makeup for the brides.

But since that fateful day, there have been three major lockdowns in Kashmir, including for Covid-19 pandemic. Due to this, weddings have become low-key affairs and has thus rendered most of the transgender community without a proper source of livelihood.

Sabira, a 35-year-old trans-man, who was abandoned by his family, too lost his traditional means of earning through matchmaking and dancing at weddings, and soon entered into a compromise.

“It breaks my heart to do this, but do I have a choice?” asks Sabira.

He is not educated, doesn’t have any skills and has no social support system of the family, relatives or even friends outside the transgender community.

“It is a do or die situation where practically shame and society takes a backseat,” Sabira laments.

Muskan is not an expert in matchmaking but feels that the business is now restricted to a bunch of known old trans-people.

Humiliating treatment

“Life has become too difficult. I have only managed a few wedding bookings for singing and dancing which are extremely underpaid and sometimes abusive, humiliating and horrible as well,” she says.

Recently, Muskan was singing at a wedding function in Srinagar where she bumped into a client who is in a white collar profession. “He knew me well. He had paid for sex several times but at the function, he asked the relatives to throw me out,” she laments. “They shouted that prostitutes aren’t allowed in their homes. I tried to resist but it was humiliating and horrifying.”

According to Muskan, trans-sex workers can be seen at some designated spots in Srinagar every day after 8:30 pm. She meets her clients on Boulevard Road, a popular tourist destination along the banks of Dal Lake.

“We do it either in car, in rented place or in a hotel with a group,” says Muskan who lives with her another trans-sex worker. “We never prefer not to book clients at our places as it will create problems for us socially.”

Sex work in Kashmir, apart from social unacceptability, can be dangerous and risky.

“Sometimes if someone sees us at night getting out of a car, they start beating us on the road itself,” Muskan says.

“Some clients refuse to pay the agreed amount after sex,” she says, adding that they are sometimes assaulted too. “I was gagged, beaten and thrown out of the car several times without money. Can we call that rape?” she asks.

In the past two years during winters, Muskan travelled to Jammu and Delhi. Apart from better rates, which sometimes is 10 times what they get in Kashmir, sex workers largely remain invisible and faceless in bigger cities.

Sharief, a 43-year-old transgender, says he has two regular customers who work in legal and enforcement wings. Sometimes, he says, they get their friends along, which is not part of the deal and they “force themselves on me with no extra payment”.

“They threaten to leak my identity and silence me. They leave me dejected as a smeared slut with both my body and soul bruised,” he complains.

It all started at home

They have no control on the kind of clients they deal with. At times, these clients are close relatives, who exploit, blackmail and threaten them into the sexual act.

Arshi, a 24-year-old trans-person, says problems started at home.

“My mother loved me immensely, but my father and brothers had problems with my tone of speaking, body language, mannerism and they disliked almost everything about me,” she says.

If they spotted Arshi outside her house, they would drag her inside and thrash her for socialising as it would bring unnecessary attention to her identity and attract gossip about the family. Finally, Arshi escaped from her house and started living separately. When her father died, she went home only to be thrown out by her brothers along with her mother.

In her one-room rented accommodation, she takes care of her aged mother and pays rent of ₹2,000 every month. She arranges for her living, food, clothes and medicine.

“I was struggling to earn and took to sex work to take care of me and my mother,” she laments.

When her brother came to know about it, he was furious, shouting, “Why are you going outside, I can pay you for sex as well,” Arshi says with a stunned face.

She recalls that sexual abuse started at home since she was 15 years old.

“My maternal uncle would sexually abuse me. Later my cousins did the same. I was a sex toy for my family and now I have become a sex toy for the society.”

Rising risk

This tragedy is beyond a few cases. “The number of transgenders engaging in sex work, as per the reports I get may have increased significantly during three lockdowns since 2019,” says Ajaz Ahmad Bund, a prominent transgender activist, who works with this community in Kashmir.

As per 2011 census, the number of transgenders in J&K was 4,137, of which 207 belong to SC and 385 to ST categories. The literacy rate of trans-community in J&K is 49.20 percent. According to a recent study, conducted by an NGO working with transgenders the percentage of transgenders engaged in sex work has increased from 2 percent in 2013-14 to 15 percent in 2019. However, the unreported numbers may be much higher.

Sex work has also raised the dangers of infections that could prove fatal for them. In the Covid-19 pandemic, it is a double edged sword.

Muskan says she goes for HIV and STI (sexually transmitted infections) tests every six months, even during Covid-19 times. “I prefer to go for an HIV test before Covid-19 vaccination,” she says, indicating that she considers HIV more important than Covid-19. “Sex work fetches me money otherwise, before Covid-19, hunger would have ended my life.”

The Peoples Social and Cultural Society (PSCS) is the only NGO in Srinagar who conduct HIV and STI testing for MSM (Men Sex Men), which include transgenders as well.

According to PSCS data, from 2016 to 2018, around 898 MSM tests were done and nobody tested positive for HIV. From 2019 till July this year, 1580 MSM tests were done and three HIV positive cases were reported.

The NGO maintains that they have around 400 registered sex workers which include 300 male-sex workers and 100 transgenders. Among the 100, four transgenders have been tested HIV positive whereas only one male sex worker is presently positive. On an average, 1,400 condoms are being distributed monthly by this NGO.

No support system

“The consecutive lockdowns since 2019, political uncertainty in Kashmir has further shrunk our means of earning, which was already challenged due to the rise in the number of love marriages. Our role as a wedding-singing troupe is also diminishing with the growing demand of modern singing bands in Kashmir weddings,” says Sharief.

Even though some Good Samaritans came to the rescue of this marginalised community by distributing food kits during the lockdowns, the larger sense of acknowledgement of their problems, collective welfare and institutional help remains elusive till date.

Khushi Mir, a trans-social activist and a makeup artist, says that the new generation of trans-persons in Kashmir have at least made it to the higher secondary level school education and they are exploring new fields as well.

“Many of them are making a name in fashion designing, modelling, makeup but now the government should make policies to empower them,” Khushi says.

A few trans-people have managed to get the Below Poverty Line ration cards. “But they complain that these cards are not accepted by ration store keepers. They just reject them and give excuses that they are not in their list,” alleges Kushi.

Last year, the government decided that trans-people will be included under an integrated social security scheme in which they will get ₹1000 on a monthly basis. “But is this amount enough for a living?” Khushi asks.

This “small and insignificant amount” portrayed as social security, says Khushi, is unable to prevent the distressed community members from taking to uncomfortable alternatives.

(Names of persons quoted in this story other than activists have been changed to protect their identity)