A cart to recovery

CHENNAI: While the adage ‘Give a man a fish…’ has taken various forms over the past few centuries, here’s social activist and writer Apsara Reddy scripting a new version in aid of the transgender community. Helping one fish-seller transwoman to earn a living by running her own food cart and her success would help fuel the ones to come.

With 53-year-old Muthuma Shobha — the first participant in Apsara’s Dignity Project — having done well for herself (after months of struggle since the start of the lockdown), the pilot project has now been officially rolled out to offer a livelihood for six transwomen. “We did a pilot project with one transwoman (inaugurated on September 1) and it fared very well.

The feedback I got from her is that a lot of people are buying from her and she makes up to Rs 1,500 a day,” shares Apsara, about Muthuma’s cart from where the latter sells breakfast and dinner — idli, dosa, prawn biryani, chapati and kuruma. “Now, we’re doing it with six transwomen — with five food carts and one tailoring machine,” she adds. The intent behind the Dignity Project was to go past charity and give the women something with which they can earn a livelihood.

“Most of the transwomen had no traditional source of income. And because of the lockdown, they couldn’t do anything and most of them were starving too. So, we started this project, where we give them an idli cart or tailoring unit; we set up small businesses for them, where whatever else they want to do, this would be something they can fall back on,” she explains.

Be it Muthuma or the women who turned beneficiaries on Wednesday, it was their skills and abilities that got them on board the project. “We identified transgender leaders in each area and asked them to throw up some names of people who are really in need of this and have the skills as well. We found people with interest and also those above a certain age limit who have no other source of income,” she explains. That’s how 56-year-old Mahalakshmi was signed onto the project. She has been in the food cart business for ten years now. But, the years of work had worn the cart out.

And there was no means to bounce back from the lockdown setback. “I was not able to do any work for six months. With all my relatives in Tirunelveli, I was struggling by myself here. It was my house owner of 15 years who helped out, providing me with food and not taking rent. It was Malaika (Desingh, transgender model and actress) who helped me join the project,” she narrates. Mahalakshmi is set to start work from Monday, from her doorstep.

Given the obvious need for the project and its satisfying success in the past month, the only thing keeping it from benefitting more transwomen is lack of adequate funds, reports Apsara. “We need a lot more sponsors. Each of the cart costs Rs 60,000, including the equipment, utensils and a month’s provisions, and the transportation of these materials to wherever they are at. Corporate sponsorship would be really nice; if someone can take up this project and we can keep identifying people and executing it, that’s something which I really look forward to. Because we do it as and when we are able to, I sponsor half of it, and friends pitch in. But we want to do it and I have a target of doing at least a 100 carts by the end of 2021,” she concludes.