Hijras Of India (news article)
India: Begging eunuchs of Bombay  
  
In Bombay and other big cities of India you come across groups of people  
called "Hijras" or "Chakkas". These are eunuchs, castrated between the ages of  
10 and 15 years on supposedly religious grounds. You find then asking for alms  
near places of tourist interest, outside halls where weddings or naming  
ceremonies are taking place, and outside houses where there are newborn
babies.  
The style of begging is very aggressive. In groups of three or four they  
confront individuals, clapping and making gestures with their fingers. Give
them  
money and they will bless you and your family and pray for increased libido
for  
you and for male heirs for your family. Refusal is followed by abuse, and  
obscene gestures, and some of them will lift their "petticoats", exposing
their  
genitals and cursing. The Hijras live in communities. Why do they live like  
this? To find out we decided to ask them.  
  
We contacted Hijras begging at the traffic lights outside our hospital. It  
took two months of persuasion before they agreed to talk and to provide data.  
Individual interviews were refused but we were invited to their colony near  
Sionkoliwada in Bombay's slums and were allowed to conduct group interviews
with  
35 Hijras in groups of 3 or 4. Eventually, clinical photography was permitted  
by 5 of them, for a sum of 200 rupees.  
  
The Hijras were between 20 and 45 years old. Almost all of them had been  
sold by their poverty-stricken parents or kidnapped as children. Subsequently  
they were castrated, including a penectomy, without anaesthesia. We were told  
that many children died from complications such as sepsis or haemorrhage. Most  
came from Tamil Nadu, but many of the Tamil speakers could speak and
understand  
Hindi.  
  
They lived in small huts in Sionkoliwada and got along well with their  
neighbours in the slums. They had no source of income other than alms, and  
theirs was a hand-to-mouth existence. Alcohol abuse and drugs (hashish) were  
common. They were very much against the idea of seeking medical care from our  
hospital, which they knew was attached to a medical college, and only accident  
cases were taken to a public hospital. They feared intrusion into their
privacy  
by the inquisitive junior doctors in hospitals. They followed the Hindu
religion  
but had a goddess of their own--a reincarnation of Durga, perched on a
rooster,  
called "Bahucharaji Devimaa". PAGE 3  
The Lancet, January 4, 1992  
  
As we gaind the confidence of the elders in the Hijra community, some broke  
down and said they were contemplating suicide because they did not want to go
on  
living in this way. We learned that well-organised gangs kidnap children in
poor  
areas of India or buy them from starving parents for as little as 30 rupees.
The  
boys are then brought to the cities, castrated, and set up as beggars, who
will  
be money-making machines for up to 40 years. These Mafia-type kidnap gangs
thus  
exploit the religious sentiments and collective psyche of the Hindu community.  
They provide protection and living quarters for the Hijras, who in turn pass
on  
a percentage of their earnings to the gang in charge of their area.  
  
At the age of 16-18 the Hijras do develop a desire for sexual activity,  
directed towards males. To satisfy this need they go and stay with other men
in  
the neighbourhood who are living alone or whose wives are sick or away from  
home. They do all the household work and agree to receptive anal intercourse,  
from which they get sexual gratification. This desire diminishes with age, and  
by age 40-45 they stop indulging in such activities. In two of the men we  
examined clinically the perianal skin was scarred and thickened, suggesting a  
healed inflammatory condition. Some of the men described lesions that may have  
been anal condylomas. Although we suggested that all of them have free testing  
for HIV at our hospital none agreed to this.  
  
In parts of India today young boys are at risk of being kidnapped or sold  
and then forced to live a subhuman life as eunuchs. The authorities are aware
of  
these activities and Indian newspapers have exposed these and other atrocities  
committed on poverty-stricken rural populations. But in a corruption-loaded  
society such as India's political protection sustains Mafia-style activities.  
Pressure from the medical community may succeed where publicity elsewhere has  
failed. The practice must be stopped and for those surviving victims  
rehabilitation should be offered, permitting life with some sort of dignity.