Country’s first transgender OT technician

Kolkata, June 21: Breaking new ground, Kolkata’s Jiya Das has become the first transgender Operation Theatre technician in an Indian hospital, but theatre artists and actors from the community still face discrimination in the culture-loving city, say activists. Jiya, who once had to dance at gun point in soirees in Uttar Pradesh, is now working in a city-based super-specialty hospital, said Bappaditya Mukherjee, Secretary, Prantakatha, an organisation working for marginalised youth. “For young people, it is very important to get livelihood. Almost one and half years back, we organised an event called ‘Saathrangi’. During that event, a health entrepreneur said that he will take two members of the transgender community and train them as OT technicians. “Today Jiya Das is the first transgender OT technician in the country,” said Mukherjee. Jiya is treated at par with others in the hospital, he said at a panel discussion titled “South Asian Dialogue on LGBTQI Youth and Livelihood Discrimination” at the American Centre on Wednesday. However, Ranjita Sinha, member of the West Bengal Transgender Board, said problems of the transgender community are getting confused with female issues. (IANS)