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Sumitra Nair
Sumitra Nair

THIRD GENDER

TransVision: On a mission, with a vision

transvision1 (Clockwise from left) Anjali Kalyanapu, Jhanvi Rai, Sonia Shaik and Rachana Mudraboyina

The first Trans channel in the country hopes to dispel myths around the transgender community

Transgenders—more commonly known as hijras—have been part of the Indian society for long. The community is surrounded by superstitions and are often stereotyped. While some consider hijras as good omen, some consider otherwise. They are usually associated with begging and sex trade. And they are often invited for weddings or birth announcements to ward off 'nazar' or evil eye. As Rachana Mudraboyina, founder of TransVision, rightly puts it, mainstream media has always showcased them as an evil character, a comic relief or in a vulgar manner. 

It was only in 2014 that the Supreme Court recognised transgenders as the third gender. However, as Rachna says, “there have not been any policies for the third gender”. And this prompted her to start TransVision, India's first YouTube channel for the community, along with her friends Anjali Kalyanapu, Jhanvi Rai, Sonia Shaik and Moses Tulasi. A filmmaker by profession, Moses met Rachna in 2015 when he made a documentary on the transgender community called Walking the Walk. The film followed the pride walk organised to protest against the murder of a trans woman, Pravallika, in January that year. The walk took elements from popular Hindu festivals in the Telangana region—Bonalu and Bothakamma. 

Post this, Moses and Rachana stayed in touch. And when Rachana expressed the need for an exclusive transgender YouTube channel, he readily came on board. “I want to highlight the plight of marginalised communities in India through my films,” says Moses, who works as a producer for the channel. Moses's latest project is Knock Knock, a short film. The channel already has one episode available online for viewing. “We have planned 24 episodes—eight each in Telugu, Kannada and Urdu,” he explains. The episodes in Kannada and Telugu will focus mainly on need for laws and policies, international laws for transgenders and look at their cultural, social and political life. The Urdu episodes will focus on people from the trans community coming forward and sharing their stories. 

“We will also have activists, irrespective of whether or not they belong to the community, to talk about the community at large and answer FAQs. All the shows will have English subtitles,” he adds. 

The channel has three hosts, one for each language—Anjali for the Telugu episodes, Jhanvi for Kannada and Sonia for Urdu. “Eventually we aim to do shows in Malayalam, Tamil and move on to Hindi,” he adds. The reason for choosing vernacular languages is simple. “We do not think in English,” Moses says, and Rachana agrees. The team also believes that the reach will be better if the shows are in vernacular languages as it establishes a better connect with the audience as opposed to English. Why did they chose to operate on YouTube and not approach an existing mainstream channel? “Because, as I said earlier, the mainstream media tends to stereotype us. Also, I felt that there is more freedom to express ourselves on a platform like YouTube,” Rachana confesses. The channel that had approached the crowdfunding platform Wishberry for assistance in filming all the episodes, had managed to source sufficient funds by September 8. 

transvision2 Sonia Shaik is a survivor of domestic abuse and acid attack

The aim of the channel is to dispel the myths surrounding the community. “People tend to think that we aren't good people or have mental disorders. Some even call it a hormonal imbalance,” Rachana explains. “This is the reason there are so many crimes against transgenders. People hurt us, throw chilli powder and acid at us and even beat us up.” Drawing from her own experience, Rachana, a double postgraduate, says, “Despite having worked with various NGOs, I have had to resort to sex work at times. This was because my work was never acknowledged. And I feel the only reason for this is that I am a transgender. People only see the crimes trans people commit or how they get into sex trade. They do not understand the systematic exclusion of the community. This has to stop.” 

Rachana hopes that the simplicity of the format and the fact that many people have access to smartphones and computers, will help in spreading the message far and wide. “Propagating and dispersing right information is the only way to deal with the misconceptions. I have seen other YouTube videos giving out wrong information about our community. Take Sonia's case, who has benefited with the right kind of message being sent across. She is a survivor of domestic abuse and acid attack. We have managed to get her due compensation and got funds so that she could have the plastic surgery done,” she says.

Rachana is hopeful that, with time, the wrong perceptions will cease to exist.

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