*Denial of identity card for Aravanis in male attire and lives in biological family *
**Tamilnadu Aravanis welfare board - is formed recently by the state ministry of social welfare to take care of the welfare activities of Aravanis in Tamilnadu. The first initiative of the board is to take census of Aravanis and provide identity card with sex column as "Thiru-nanagi" [New identity proposed by Trans-gender activists]. Also this, baseline data would help to take evidence based decisions in future activities of the board. As per the plan, the board has started to enroll the names of Aravanis in some district collector offices. Reportedly, this registration process might goes up to the end this month (September). In this process, the board seeks the help of Nayaks [Leaders of Aravanis community] to recommend/ acknowledge the persons coming for registration as "Aravani". Also, the government officials who are in this process have given complete freedom to Nayaks to select or reject as they like. With this background, *Susi kumar* [name changed], a self-identified Aravani from the upper middle class family visited the collector office to enroll her name. During the enrollment, she was verbally abused by the Nayak for not affiliated to jamath [Association of Aravanis], not done emasculation, and not in female attire. Even though she gave many valid excuses and tried badly to prove her choice of gender identity as "Thiru-nangai", all her efforts went in vain. Finally, she was rejected by the Nayak and labeled as non-Aravani. She also had to beg the government officials by showing all her female attire photographs that she had taken in private. But, the government officials were also seems to be helpless as they wanted green signal from the Nayak. Susi kumar, unlike other Aravanis, lives in family and in male attire. When she explaining the importance of the identity card for her: "I live in my family. As I love my mother and family, I don't wish to leave them and join with Aravanis community. Recently, my mother, my only hope in life also passed away. My brothers often abuse me verbally and sometimes physically. My neighbors also often mimic me for my feminine mannerism. As I don't have any emotional support, they [family members] might send me out of family at any time. My brothers are very curious about my family property. This identity card would help me to seek the support of police and lawyers incase of any such issues." When the Nayak of the district was asked the reason for rejecting Susi Kumar, she raised her concern that - only those Aravanis like her who comes out of family, and live in female attire faces many issues in life but Aravanis living in family do not face such problems. She added that, if they enroll persons based on the self -identity, all males would come and get the benefits given to Aravanis. Gayathri [name changed], a Trans-gender activist also extended her voice in support of Susi kumar. According to her, the self identity of an individual should be respected without giving importance to physical attire and emasculation status etc. She said that, often this kind of lack of acceptance within the community for invisible Aravanis who lives in family forces them to choose sex reassignment surgery and come out of family. And, finally the lack of any support systems forces them in to full time sex work. Thus, sex work poses them and their clients in to HIV risk. She also added that, often kothis [this identity refers both who lives in female and male attire] face verbal abuse, violence and sexual harassment at many places out of their feminine mannerism. This kind of initiative would help them at large to take legal actions against such human rights violations. Amoka [name changed], a queer activist who work for HIV based NGOs shared her concern in this regard. In her words: "Each one's individual identity should be respected. We always blame the society for stigmatizing us based on some social constructions and judgments. But, this is also the self stigma with the community. Also, no non-Aravani will misuse the opportunity as the excuse given by the Nayak for rejecting Susi. No one is going to crown us if we identity as we are. All we get by identifying as Aravani is only stigma and discrimination. Union is strength. Let us embrace all and accept Susi." She also added that NGO working in HIV should also take care of non-sexual health issues such as advocating for human rights issues like this. This potentially results in reaching out to many people and thus control the epidemic. Thus, after series of advocacies only recently government has taken initiatives for the welfare of Aravanis. Also, HIV prevalence has been increasing at alarming rate among Aravanis and other similarly marginalized populations. In this situation, this type of discrimination within the community might make the community further invisible and often becomes barrier to attain the goal of NACP III: to saturate the coverage of high risk group. According to you, Who are real Aravanis? Is Susi deserves for Identity card? D. Dinesh Kumar, Erode, Tamilnadu.
