Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Saturday, April 14, 2012
‘We deserve a home too’
While a beauty pageant queen in Canada is making headlines for being transgendered and taking on Donald Trump, the grim prospects of our very own city queens is touching.
Kalki, a dancer and actor who even starred in a movie titled Narthaki, was refused a rental property because of her sexuality. Kalki who now lives like a woman was turned away, leaving her totally disillusioned.
This apparently isn’t the first time the inspirational speaker is being turned down. “Since 2008, when I first moved to this city from Kerala, I have faced a lot of traumatic times. People sometimes can be polite when they refuse but some others are blatantly insulting.”
She adds, “I found a special home in the US With all the work that I have done in India, US government honoured me and invited me for a fellowship. The irony is, in my own country I get treated like a second class citizen, where as a foreign government was instilling dignity and respect.”
Kalki, who now lives in Auroville in Pondicherry says, “I had to move out of town as people are too judgmental when it comes to seeing transgender women in the right light. Sunil Menon, a gay rights activist, says, “This problem persists mainly for the transgender folks, when it comes to a gay couple, identity can always been kept a secret. Also, the old school ideology that has many thinking that all transgenders are still only sex-workers might be the prime reason.
But for sure, our country needs is a concrete law that would render justice to this sect, whether it is lesbians, gays, bisexuals or transgender. But in this case you cannot force anyone to rent their house to you just because you have the money to pay. There in is the ambiguity and it's sad.”
Magdalene Jeyarathnam, director of Chennai’s East West Center for Counselling, says, “It’s just unfair and a stringent law to prevent discrimination is the key. One must have application forms complete with a reference checking process.
If one ticks all the boxes, no one should deny eligible tenants a home. People should just dart back to history and it will demonstrate that the gay culture existed right from the beginning and we need to adopt a more familiar stance than a hard-line approach.”
Elaborating on the legal implications with respect to such occurrences Lawyer Venkatesh, explains, “Legally, the house owner has all rights to rent or not.”
In the interim while the debate continues, Kalki has planned to write to the Chief Minister Jayalalithaa and the Social Welfare ministry to have a dialogue with the disadvantaged groups in the city