How the Covid-19 pandemic has affected trans people

In the days before the pandemic, Shruthi M, a transwoman, made a living by blessing people at celebratory events. For the ensuing year and a half, such events have thinned out and so has her income. Since Shruthi is diabetic, with no income she has to think of the cost of essential medication.

A dose of insulin costs Rs 400 and this weekly cost is next to impossible to bear. “I just take the tablets even though the doctor has told me to not stop Insulin doses,” she says.

Trans people with comorbidities have no way to afford essential drugs.

While some NGOs are trying to help, they can’t reach all. “Many people will be left out, with no support,” she says. Added to this is the inability to pay her electricity bill, she lives in dread that her home, which houses five others from the trans community, will plunge into darkness.

Like Shruthi M, thousands of other people from the transgender community face a bleak future.

Read | Transgender people demand Covid relief

Left without many avenues, trans people are often forced into begging, sex work or earn their living by blessing families on happy occasions explains Umi, the founder-director of Jeeva, an organisation that advocates for trans rights. “Very few of us have regular jobs. Stigma, early abandonment by families, discrimination, and harassment often lead us to take up these jobs,” she says.

As people stay in, many trans people find themselves with no means to support themselves.

Nandanamma N, a trans woman from Davangere, explains that scrounging up money to buy even food grain and pulses has become difficult. “As of now, we depend on charitable people to donate money or food. If they stop this service, we don’t have another option,” she says.

Last year, even though sparse, ration kits were distributed by some municipal corporations, this year even that seems absent, says Umi.

Added to all these trials and tribulations are instances that break the spirit of the trans community says Manjamma Jogathi, the chairperson of the Karnataka Janapada Academy, in reference to an instance of a young trans woman assaulted brutally by a PSI in Kolar. “That affected me,” she says.

In a video that went viral and provoked much outrage, Smitha N, a 26-year-old trans woman, was beaten brutally, abused with derogatory words for stepping out to get medicines from the drugstore. “The PSI even said if I do this to you, it’ll make an example for the rest of your people,” says Smitha. “I was made to feel like I was not a human being,” she adds poignantly.

Inadequate relief measures

Under the Mythri scheme, the state government provides a monthly pension of Rs 600 to people from the transgender community. The Centre also announced a one-time subsistence allowance of Rs 1,500 to help meet the daily requirements of trans people because of Covid related distress. However, coverage under such schemes is poor. The Mythri scheme, for example, covers only 1,657 trans people in the state. But such schemes ask for some form of identification— Aadhar cards, voter IDs, ration cards or in some cases, gender certificates. “Many people are abandoned by their families, these documents are difficult to obtain. The gender certification does not respect our right for self-identification,” Umi says.

Even those who received support from the schemes say that it was in no way adequate to get them through these difficult times. “The schemes are not even sufficient to pay rent,” says Umi. Since most trans people do not have homes of their own and are abandoned by families, housing has been a longstanding issue. Manjamma Jogathi says that trans people who did not reside in villages face the brunt of the housing crisis.

“Landlords often don’t want to rent to transgender people. In these circumstances, it is unclear if they will show any grace if tenants don’t pay rent,” she says. Both Shruthi and Nandanamma have been struggling to pay rent and fear that they will be homeless if things don’t improve.

Nandanamma, Shruthi and Umi all ask this question— ‘are we not human?’

If the government has announced relief measures for other sectors, why not for us too, asks Shruthi. “Do our lives not matter?”