How these 25 transgenders found shelter in Chennai after 5 years of struggle
Shelter is one of the basic rights of every human being. However, for a vast majority, this right become a luxury. While there are state-supported shelters to take in people who cannot afford roofs over their heads, the situation has been very different for transgenders.
Even when they are from economically stable families, unable to bear the stigma and suffocation, they run away from home. In other cases, they are forced to get out by families who do not understand or accept them. Renting a house is almost impossible for them.
Unfortunately, even government shelters reject transgenders. Hence, transgenders' struggle for a separate shelter has been a long-standing one. While they were fighting for a shelter in Mumbai, Fida, one of the transgenders told The Times of India,
"There are a lot of handicapped kinnars (transgenders) who are either homeless, or who have faced acid attacks. Some of them have sustained injuries after being thrown from trains while begging. There are old age ashrams, but there is nothing for transgenders."
In this scenario, the Chennai Corporation has done something worthy of applause—it has opened its first night shelter for transgenders after five years of continuous struggle.
The shelter doesn't just act as a roof over their heads. On the one hand, it acts as a halfway house for transgenders for whom it is difficult to find a place to stay. On the other hand, in the time that they stay there, they are also given vocational training to help them find employment and become self-dependent.
The shelter, which can accommodate 25 women, is already filled to capacity. Sumithra, one of the transgenders living there, told The Hindu,
“This home is very useful for us—it is comfortable, the neighbours are social, and the locality is good. There should be more such homes across the State.”
These trans people will be staying here for a period of four to six months within which they will be given sufficient training to get back on their feet. However, it is not just important to give them skill training but also essential to sensitise the employers to be willing to accept them as employees.
They were initially fighting for a shelter for 50 people, but they are able to get space only for half the strength. Moreover, there is no compound wall to protect them at night and there is also a lack of metro water facility. Hopefully, these issues will be addressed at the earliest by the Chennai Corporation.
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