Third sex gets official status in Tamil Nadu

[Shana A]

Third sex gets official status in Tamil Nadu
16 Mar 2008, 0059 hrs IST,Pushpa Narayan,TNN
 
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Third_sex_gets_official_status_in_TN/articleshow/2869909.cms

CHENNAI: So far Pooja, a 25-year-old transsexual from Salem in Tamil Nadu, had nothing to prove her existence in government records because she had refused to be identified as either a male or a female, the only two options available in the gender column of the application forms.

Finally, the state has recognized her as an individual and given her a ration card where the sex column is marked T instead of M or F.

[RebeccaFog]

    I don't understand why the woman would refuse an F designation if she is a transsexual.  Isn't that the goal?
    Maybe it was a political move to help others who are in the middle?

a community of 40,000.   whoa!

[Shana A]

New Ration Cards Include T For Transgendered

Transsexuals get their due in Tamil Nadu

http://iimsai.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-ration-cards-include-t-for.html

Chennai: So far Pooja, a 25-year-old transsexual from Salem in Tamil Nadu, had nothing to prove her existence in government records because she had refused to be identified as either a male or a female, the only two options available in the gender column of the application forms. Finally, the state has recognised her as an individual and given her a ration card where the sex column is marked T instead of M or F.

[Hypatia]

I don't understand why the woman would refuse an F designation if she is a transsexual.  Isn't that the goal?

Probably because in Hindu culture, definitions of male and female genders are tied to making babies. Anyone who doesn't is categorized as "third gender." Only women who bear children are considered real women. I find this definition of womanhood extremely patriarchal and sexist, but it's what has molded Hindu attitudes toward transgender, which has been openly acknowledged for thousands of years. Meanwhile, the modern West has just discovered the subject.

However, one aruvani in Tamil Nadu has protested against the Hindu gender classification and asserted that she is a woman.

"Don't call us eunuchs or Hijras or by other 'names'. We like ourselves to be called as females....Yes we are transgendered females," says Aasha Bharathi, president of Tamil Nadu Aravanigal Association.