Becoming KABIR

Becoming Kabir

I knew something was wrong since I was 6. It wasn’t just the absence of friends from my life or the constant fights at home. It was that female school uniform that I was forced to wear every single morning, seeing which I could not help but cry. This isn’t me-the voice inside me cried out loud but could not find a way to my throat. When I cried, my parents thought I was being stubborn, and so I was beaten every morning till grade 6. Though in spite of the uniform, I had one respite-my constant short hair, which my mom maintained because of her tight morning schedule. But how long could I be who I wasn’t? I experienced this turmoil for a long time. Each passing year, it grows stronger. It wasn’t the uniform now. It was my crush at school who probably would have hated me if I told them. The fact is that I could not pursue my interest in performing arts because the teachers would never understand why I would want to be a male performer. My emotional state was a mess. It got reflected in my grades too. But no one-no grown-up bothered to take note of my mental state. I was all alone in a world that was not designed to understand me. I dreamt of running away from this world.




I still hoped to create a place for myself in the outside world. I wanted to become a journalist. I got through the screening process at a reputed college in Delhi. A good friend lent me money and I got admitted! On my first day, the Head of Department remarked that I possessed some stellar journalistic qualities which needed to be polished. I was overjoyed. But the joy was short-lived. When friends started talking about crushes and relationships, I had nothing to speak about. I was made fun of. When I started sharing bits and pieces about my preferences with close ones, I was misunderstood and soon became a topic of gossip among my batchmates. I had no friends. I did not even have the confidence to enter the classroom. The same year, I lost my father. I left college and found a job to support my family. During that time I even revealed my identity to a close group of friends from one of my workplaces before college. They assured me that they supported me. One of them soon entered into a romantic relationship with me. Life was picking up.?




But what truly liberated me was my job. I was a sex educator at a non-profit called Parwarish. This is where I learned about my sexuality in an orientation session. I finally discovered that there was nothing really wrong with me. I was a trans man - a man born in a female body. The knowledge empowered me. I no longer was a victim at the hands of this cruel world. But an empowered individual who could help and empower others. As a sex educator, I did just that. Sex education arms young people against abuse. It helps them see their growing bodies in a positive light. They see sex as it really is, not the ideas imposed by society. My profession became my passion. I have conducted sessions for 18- hours straight, in the most vulnerable regions and have reached almost 15,000 kids.?




Meanwhile, I was still hesitant about gender transition. I wondered how I being from a labor colony in Old Delhi, would be able to do this when I read successful stories of gender transition from abroad.

Nevertheless, the colleagues at Parvarish supported me and connected me with people working for the rights of transgender people. I met many amazing people on this journey who encouraged me to own my identity and story.? Meeting these people, a lot of anxiety eased out and I finally decided to take the plunge and start Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT).




I feel great about the changes happening in my body with this therapy. But I face a new set of challenges now. Something as simple as which public washroom to use? Male public washrooms are standing urinals and when I go to the women's washrooms, I get stares - which frankly I have been getting even before I got my HRT. Even getting a basic national identity paper has been difficult. The National Transgender Portal opened in 2021 and I gave papers for my new identity the next day. It has been two years. I still have not received my identity card from the government. Without that, I can’t even rent a house. Despite the seamless end-to-end mechanism that did not require physical movement, the officers at the portal demand transgenders to get an approval signature from their community. The good intention behind the portal has come down to nothing. The people at the bottom who run it are from the same homophobic society who think being transgender is a crime.?




When I found out my decade-long love lied to me all along about her family’s non-acceptance of me and used that as a reason to extort money from me for years, I was shattered. When I tried to retrieve my money, the police never registered an FIR. They literally shooed me away and took her testimony to be true without any cross-questioning.?




Yet, there are some sections of society that give me hope. The activists from the movement and those from the corporate sector are taking good steps to give transgenders the place they deserve in society. My current employer found me through their gender inclusivity cell.?




With all the challenges that I have encountered, I now feel I can face anything in life. After HRT, I named myself Kabir—the only one I remembered from my school books, the one beyond boxes of gender and class, the only one who I ever aspired to be.


Written By : @VanditaaKothari