Representing the transgender community and providing them equal opportunity meant everything to Mitr Trust in Delhi, who launched the country’s first-ever transgender modelling agency. At this time, four mass communication students of Jamia Millia Islamia, namely Faisal Alam, Minal Kumar, Neha Karode, Shyamolee MN and Ritwija Mukherjee, had embarked on their final year project and were toying with the idea of making a documentary on transgender models.This is when they met Shree Nagar, a transgender model, who gave them their time and insights for their work. ‘Presenting Shree’, the documentary follows Shree, showing different aspects of their life within society.
“Shree was very excited and eager to tell her story. She had the time to give us, so we focussed our documentary on her. We visited her home to see how she lived with a friend after being disowned by her family. She was very open about her sexuality and wanted to see herself as a successful model,” says Neha Karode.
The documentary follows Shree’s life after she made an appearance at a reality television show in Mumbai wherein she was publicly humiliated, “After she came on Rakhi Ka Insaaf, she had to leave Mumbai and go back to Delhi. She had to start all over again. To earn her living, Shree performs at events, weddings and private shows. We even followed her to Aligarh where she was to perform,” explains Karode. She also explains the concept of a toli, “A toli is a community for trans-people with a set structure and practice. The bill that was passed now enables people from this marginalised community to assert their basic rights and position themselves in mainstream society. There were a lot of people we met in the community who were able to complete the last leg of their education thanks to this judgement.”
But does the documentary question the law in its entirety?
Karode explains that they are not trying to be politically correct through the film, “Shree didn’t want to join the hijra community and she could abstain thanks to this law. We have portrayed the law positively, since the government has done a great job by introducing this. To a certain extent, there is need for social implementation because even today transgenders are not accepted in mainstream society. That needs to change.”
‘Presenting Shree’ will be screened at the Pune International Queer Film Festival to be held between April 7 to 9.
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