For more than a decade, Rudrani Chettri Chauhan has been fighting for the rights of her community—India’s transgenders.
Through Mitr Trust, a charity she founded in Delhi in 2005 to empower India’s sexual minorities, the 37-year-old transgender woman activist has worked to provide them education, healthcare, and the means to end violence and discrimination.
Now, she is also investing her time and energy in exploring a “different side of transgender life” that is often overlooked by the media and sneered at by popular culture—beauty.
“Half their time, especially for transgender women, is spent on trying to look beautiful,” Chauhan told Quartz.
Chauhan, who studied English literature and is an independent development consultant, is trying to set up India’s first modelling agency for the transgender community. Last week, she held an audition and photo shoot for models at Khirki Extension, a south Delhi neighbourhood. The turnout wasn’t particularly high—only some 15 aspiring transgender women, or hijras, showed up.
“They don’t have the confidence yet,” she said. ”We need to raise funds to groom them, create their portfolios, and so on.” For this, Chauhan has teamed up with Rishi Raj, a fashion stylist and photographer.
So far, her two fundraising pages—GoFundMe and BitGiving—have helped her get started. “We have only got Rs2,100 on BitGiving, an Indian crowdsourcing platform. But, on the UK one, GoFundMe, we have already raised 1,400 pounds.”
Quartz brings you a collection of photographs by Reuters from the first round of auditions on Feb. 07.
