What is in a Name? Khwaja Sara, Hijra and Eunuchs in Pakistan

This discussion draws upon research conducted in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad in 2014 with approximately 30 members of trans communities and examines the historical and contemporary politics of naming and its consequences in British India and contemporary Pakistan. I maintain that the colonial state’s view of these communities coincided with regional reformist attempts to curtail their presence in British India. Their marginalised status was challenged in Pakistan2 in 2009, however, when the Supreme Court of the country gave these communities political recognition. Changes in their status, however, I argue, do not give trans individuals full status as citizens of Pakistan. Instead, the state circumvents existing laws such as Section 377 and the Zina Ordinance to give them status as eunuchs with diseased bodies. While the state appears to direct its agencies to bring into the mainstream individuals identified through the sexually ambiguous category of eunuch, the various naming processes have resulted in the entry of individuals with alternative forms of sexualities into the public space where they demand recognition as legal citizens of Pakistan.