Indian fashion designer Sharmila Nair has featured transwomen in her campaign for her latest line of saris, titled Mazhavi, Fusion reported Monday.
The designer sought out two transwomen, Maya Menon and Gowri Savithri, through the help of the trans rights non-profit Queerala. Nair told Fusion that she hopes the campaign will help humanize transwomen in India.
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“It should really open up more opportunities for transgender [people],” she said. “People should break the ice.”
Both women featured in the campaign have had no previous professional modelling experience.
“I have never had open conversations even with my own family about this. Not many of my friends are aware that I am a transgender. But this shoot has given me the confidence to admit that I am one,” Menon told The News Minute.
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The women are from the state of Kerala, which is far progressive on trans issues than the rest of India and even the United States. Last November, state government officials enacted a policy meant to uphold transgender people's’ constitutional rights, including in the areas of education, housing and safety from violence.
“We assure the transgenders in the state that your freedom and movement will be taken care of by the Kerala Government,” M. K. Muneer, the state’s minister for social justice, had said then, as published in Fusion.
Still, Menon and Savithri, both college-educated 29 year olds are still unemployed, because they’re still being discriminated.
Nair hopes the campaign will give the women the positivity they need to eventually find employment.