I have a right to marry… and divorce

Dr Akkai Padmashali wanted to marry to have the complete feminine experience be the centre of family life like her mothermdashcook take care of a home care for her children and family members to care for neighbours and extended family dropping in for a chat celebrations and gatherings ldquoMy parents were also pressuring me to settlerdquo says the Bengalurubased social and political activist ldquoMy gender affirmation surgery was done including the breast augmentation and hormone replacement therapy They kept saying lsquoYour younger brother is married and has a child your sister has also gone to her homehellip only you are not settledrsquohelliprdquoPadmashali was the first person in Karnataka to complete her sex affirmation surgery 2012 and then the first to register her marriage under the Special Marriage Act 2018 And in the early weeks of July she exercised her right to divorce and was granted sole custody of her child Eventually she found that marriage was a heavily patriarchal construct stacked in the favour of men at the cost of womenrsquos emotional physical and financial resources and labourLike any bride Padmashali entered marriage with careful consideration and a lot of hope ldquoI wanted to bond and be faithful to one person to make a familyrdquo she says ldquoHe Vasudev V and I worked in the same organisation and he was junior to me I was a project manager in an international NGO He was always proposing lsquoLove me love mersquo Then he approached my brother and begged him to convince merdquoBoth families sat down and Akkairsquos carefully explained her transgender identity the sex affirming surgeries her allegiance to her hijra community and her history in begging and sex work How she could not bear children but wanted to adopt a child Vasudev and family eagerly convinced them that none of this mattered to them and the family told Akkai she could not find a better match There was a consensus that there would be no dowry no matching of horoscopesOn January 19 2017 Akkai enjoyed a haldi ceremony with the Hijra community ldquoI enjoyed it very muchrdquo she reminisces ldquoThey gave me bangles put haldi on me mehendi The wedding was the next day on the 20th We had invited 30 people 500 people showed up All my friends colleagues wellwishers feminists queer personshellip so many peoplerdquoThe couple had agreed that their wedding would represent all religions ldquoHe tied a thaali around my neck as per Hinduism we exchanged rings like Christians said Qubool hai three times Jain and Buddhist priests chanted prayersrdquo A year later they registered their marriage under the Special Marriages Act Their wedding night Akkai says was not as anticipated ldquoHe was terribly drunkrdquo she says ldquoAnd apologised the next dayrdquoDark days followed quickly In her divorce petition Padmashali has accused her former husband of cheating her by not revealing an earlier marriage to his niece of isolating her from her family and community of being an alcoholic stealing jewellery and money gifted to their child harassing her for dowry physical assault forced sex attempted murder and of trying to harm their child Avin Much of their life together was in Magadi town and Padmashali says she commuted to Bengaluru for work every day and was the prime earning member for their entire extended familyBut why did an activist like her who has helped many disenfranchised people get out of abusive situations not go to the police ldquoFamily intervention stopped me from going to the policerdquo she says ldquoI wanted to handle everything within the community and my elder sister in the hijra culture Soumya intervened many times The police system has their way of handling issues which I do not trustrdquo She adds that she had experienced the brutality of the system as a sex worker and beggar and would not risk it in a small town where she had no connectionsHer family had already told her that her problems were hers to sort and to not bring them to them They had even stopped inviting her to family functions Her inlaws told her to not keep in touch with her Hijra brethrenThere were some sunshine days like the coming home of their child Avin who is a distant relative of Padmashali Both Vasu and Padmashali went through the rigorous adoption process to bring Avin home when he was one month old ldquoWe had a badhai ceremony as per the Hijra culture and my guruji and all my friends gifted the baby gold jewellery and moneyrdquo But soon she says her inlaws told Vasu not accept the child as they were not genetically his ldquoThere were taunts about the colour of my skin that I could not bear children and that I was still practising sex work when I went to Bengalururdquo she says ldquoFinally Vasu said he did not want Avin I told him I didnrsquot want himrdquoPadmashali moved back into her parental home Her father had passed away by then as had her brother She is now focusing on raising Avin who is now five without gender caste or religion ldquoI have taught him that if anyone asks his fatherrsquos name he should say Akkai Motherrsquos name Akkairdquo she says ldquoI want him to grow up knowing about Hijra culture Itrsquos not that I will hide the truth about his fatherhellip itrsquos just not ageappropriaterdquoIronically Padmashali was not always the marrying typeldquoMy feminist friends and I would discuss how marriage is notional and patriarchalrdquo she says ldquoI had seen so much abuse as a sex worker and in beggingmdashthe most brutal side if menmdashand thought marriage would be the same But I had a beautiful relationship before with a cis male childhood friend It was like a marriage Venugopal accepted me the way I was we grew up together Then he wanted a biological child and married a cis het woman named Sujata and we became a sweet little family of three We would laugh together go on holidays together He passed away a year and a half ago His children still call me AmmardquoThe 40yearold wants to fight against the patriarchal notion of marriage and ldquoforms of violence within the familyrdquo Will she ever marry again ldquoI donrsquot knowrdquo she says ldquoItrsquos too soon to tell But I will have sex againhelliprdquo