Relevance: mains: G.S paper I: Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections of the population by the Centre and States and the protection and betterment of these vulnerable sections.
What is the issue?
- Currently, the sanitation needs of the transgender community are addressed on the assumption that the community is a homogeneous group, and that public toilets earmarked for them address their total sanitation requirements. · However, designing transgenderinclusive sanitation requires a deeper examination of the role of caste, gender, and age within the transgender community.
What are the sanitation related issues facing the transgenders?
- As a consequence of the underlying discrimination against the transgender community, toilets remain as sites of social exclusion and violence in their day-to-day lives.
- Transgender persons are exposed to sexual harassment and violence if they use the men’s toilets and are unwelcome in both women and men’s toilets as “it is widely believed that they are seeking sex work when they visit the toilets”.
- This leaves them with few options and many of them continue to practice open defecation, or wait to find a safe time to use the toilets.
- Thus, the transgender community faces dangers of infection, violence, humiliation, and corruption in their daily lives as they manage their sanitation needs.
What is the Manipur’s model?
- The Manipur government has introduced separate toilets for transgender persons during various festivals and in some parts of Imphal, a step that was appreciated by the transgender community.
- However, these toilets have not addressed the issue of their safety and dignity.
What are the neglected dimensions of the issue?
- Misconceived as homogenous: The transgender community is frequently presented or discussed as a homogeneous community that has more or less uniform needs from the public and community sanitation systems.
- In reality, transgender communities are heterogeneous along the caste, age, and gender axes; all or some combination of these can determine a transgender person’s access to public sanitation.
- Child transgenders: The discussion about the transgender community in India centres largely on adult transgender persons.
- The sanitation needs of young adults and children have had a limited discussion in both policy and academics.
- This requires a rethinking of not only public toilets but also toilets in schools and colleges.
- Caste: Transgender persons from disadvantaged caste communities, for example, may find it more challenging to raise funds or resources as compared to their upper-caste counterparts. Transphobia: Transgender persons encounter everyday transphobia, including while using public toilets.
- Moreover, the definition of transgender sanitation requires to expand and include the needs of transgender persons who menstruate, are disabled, or are post-operative.
- For example, countries in the West such as the UK now use the term “menstruator” to indicate that other genders and not just women menstruate.
What is the way forward?
- Tackling transphobia: To have transgender-inclusive sanitation, it is essential to recognise the need for tackling transphobia through policy, law, employment, and social integration.
- Manipur can serve as an example of how to initiate such dialogues and how sanitation can function as a starting point into these discussions.
- Recognition of their hetrogeneity: The first step is to recognise that this community is not a homogeneous group and there are significant dynamics along the caste, age, and other axes.
- Addressing safety issues: Technical solutions can only meet their sanitation needs partly.
- Although the central government allowed transgender persons to use the restrooms of their choice (male or female) in public and community toilets, this move may not automatically ensure safety from violence.
- Transgender persons have reported facing verbal and physical violence while using both, the female and male toilets.
- All transgender experiences are not the same and, therefore, the design of the public toilets needs to provide enough scope for privacy and anonymity to those who do not wish to single out their identity.
- Therefore, a one-size-fits-all “toilet for third gender” or sharing toilets with women, will not automatically lead to transgender-inclusive sanitation.
- The next step is to acknowledge that transgender persons have varying sanitation needs at different stages of their lives, and school- and collegelevel transgender-inclusive sanitation can be crucial during their formative years.
- While speaking to children might be challenging, it is possible to speak with adult transgender persons to collect retrospect insights into transgender children’s needs.
- Finally, there is a need to expand the meaning of sanitation for transgender persons to include menstrual hygiene and reproductive care. In short, transgender-inclusive sanitation requires a deeper understanding of their social, cultural, biological needs through various life stages.