The wedding hall is loud with music and laughter. Near the entrance, Sameer Ahmad claps and sings, her voice rising above the noise, her movements practiced over decades. People smile, press currency notes into her hands, and look away just as quickly. For a moment, she is celebrated, the next completely invisible.
Sameer has been performing at weddings since 1994, the year she left home at the age of roughly twenty, carrying, as she puts it, "nothing except fear and uncertainty." She had dropped out of school in class eight, driven out by daily mockery.
"People would laugh at the way I looked and behaved," she says. "Slowly I began feeling isolated even among my own classmates." The wedding circuit gave her enough to live on, even though barely, like others from her community. But the work is drying up now, and last year she suffered a major heart attack.
"Today even buying medicines has become a struggle. There are days when I sit alone and wonder how long we will continue living like this."
Sameer belongs to a community that most people in Jammu and Kashmir see regularly but seldom think about: the hijras or eunuchs, known also locally as zananas - transgender persons, specifically those whose gender identity was apparent from early childhood.
They are present at births, weddings, and public celebrations. They are rarely present in government offices, hospital waiting rooms that acknowledge their existence, or political manifestos that mention their name. This is a story about that absence.
Data and Promises Ring Hollow
The community is not small. A government survey conducted in 2020 identified approximately 4,000 transgender persons across Jammu and Kashmir. The number likely undercounts a population that has strong reasons to remain invisible. The data confirms that the administration knows this community exists, has counted its members, and has made promises in response.
But whether it has kept them is another story.
Mohd Aslam, a community member from Srinagar, recalls a moment of unusual political attention. "When Mehbooba Mufti's government came, they made a promise to us and even passed a cabinet resolution that transgender people would receive a pension of ₹3,000, along with life and health insurance." She pauses. "To this day, that resolution has not been implemented on the ground."
Advocate Farhat Fayaz, a human rights activist, is categorical: "Every government speaks about inclusion, equality and justice, but when it comes to transgender rights, their lips are sealed. Policies are announced, but implementation remains absent. What this community needs is not sympathy or token gestures. It needs concrete legal protection, equal opportunities and representation in decision-making."
There is no dedicated housing scheme. There is no reservation in education or government employment. No comprehensive safety policy exists. And for many in the community, the absence of proper identity documents creates a bureaucratic wall that blocks access even to whatever limited schemes do exist on paper.
Wasif Manzoor, a postgraduate student in sociology at the University of Kashmir, has been studying the community's political exclusion. "Their issues are rarely mentioned in election manifestos," he says, "even though they continue to face discrimination in education, healthcare, housing and employment.
Politicians seek their votes but ignore their struggles afterwards. Reservation, legal protection and equal opportunities are not acts of charity. They are basic rights that every citizen deserves."
Naseer, from Srinagar, confirms this from personal experience. "Politicians come to our areas during elections, making promises. Once the elections are over, no one talks about our rights, our struggles, or our future. We are citizens of this country too. All we ask for is dignity, equal rights, and recognition as human beings."
“Our lives matter too,” she says, her voice and words reflecting pain and frustration that stems from years of neglect.
The exclusion is not only political. It is woven into daily life in ways that accumulate. Each incident is small enough to be dismissed, but their combined weight is crushing.
Ubaid, also from Srinagar, describes it from childhood. "I still remember how people laughed at the way I spoke and behaved. In school, students mocked me openly and treated me differently, as if I did not belong there. Slowly, I lost confidence and stopped attending classes because every day felt like a battle against insults."
At home, the situation was no easier. "Families often worry more about society's judgement than the emotional suffering of their own children. There were days when I felt unwanted even in my own home."
Many leave. It is less a choice. It is the only option.
Mohd Shaban grew up in Sopore in north Kashmir. After completing secondary school, which was more than many in the community managed to get, his family pressed him to conceal his identity. "I could not deny who I truly was. I left home with tears in my eyes and started living alone in a small, rented room in Srinagar.
There were nights when I slept hungry and cried silently." Today, people call him Shabnam Ji. He has built something - a life, a name, a measure of dignity earned entirely by himself. "Despite all the hardships," he says, "I learned to stand on my own feet."
Self-reliance in this community exists admirably through informal support networks, small businesses, the passing on of skills and emotional sustenance between members. But it is not enough.
With limited access to formal education and employment, many transgender persons rely on traditional occupations such as manghat (ceremonial singing and blessing), makeup work, or other informal jobs. However, the livelihoods are becoming increasingly unstable.
A common story each one of them narrates: some nights, people from our community sleep hungry and silently cry themselves to sleep because they feel forgotten by society. But Ubaid adds that the hardest part is not poverty but the feeling that society refuses to see us as human beings.
Rejection and loneliness begin early – inside homes, from childhood. It continues seamlessly everywhere - schools, hospitals, offices, and even on the streets.
Jamsheed, from Srinagar, finds even the most basic necessities charged with humiliation. "Even renting a small room becomes a struggle because landlords refuse to trust us. We work hard, dream like everyone else, and only want to live with dignity. But society keeps pushing us away, making us feel unwanted and invisible."
“People judge us before knowing who we are,” she says.
Irshad Ahmad, from Baramulla, talks about the texture of structural exclusion which no policy document can explain. "People would refuse to sit beside me. Children pointed and laughed. Some shopkeepers would not speak to us respectfully. These things may seem small to others, but when they happen every day, they slowly break a person from inside."
She continues, "The government and society must understand that transgender people do not need pity. We need opportunities, protection and respect. Real change will come only when transgender children can walk into schools without fear, when families stop treating them as a burden, and when society finally sees us not as outsiders but as equal human beings."
Lubna, a postgraduate student in social work at the University of Kashmir, points to how deeply this exclusion is institutionalised. "Even in the 21st century, in spaces like hospitals, we still see only male and female categories with no space for others. This silent exclusion is a form of harm. We may not call it a crime, but through our systems and behaviour, we deny people their identity."
She notes that science has long recognised that gender is not binary but public institutions have not caught up with this finding.
Advocate Asif Ali of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court agrees that the structural failures are urgent and specific. "Many in the community struggle to access work, healthcare and education, often relying on informal livelihoods. While national and UT-level policies exist, weak implementation and administrative hurdles leave many without benefits. Urgent focus is needed on economic inclusion, healthcare access and protection from discrimination."
Social activist John Muhammad Bahar says, "In a society that boasts faith and justice, denying dignity to the transgender community exposes our moral bankruptcy. The rights we guard for ourselves belong to them equally."
Javaid, from Baramulla, speaks for much of the community when he explains what they want. "We are tired of being treated as invisible citizens. We do not want sympathy or charity. We want reservation in education and employment, proper healthcare, legal protection, and the right to live with dignity. Like every citizen, we deserve acceptance, opportunities, and a future free from discrimination."
Meanwhile, some from the community continue to count what they earned at a wedding hall or a ceremony, and some may be singing themselves to sleep with hunger pangs in their bellies. The world has its eyes shut.
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