![]() ![]() ![]() These communities have sustained themselves over generations by "adopting" boys who are in abject poverty, rejected by, or flee, their family of origin. In South Asia, many hijras live in well-defined and organised all-hijra communities, led by a guru. This history features a number of well-known roles within subcontinental cultures, part gender-liminal, part spiritual and part survival. Hijras have a recorded history in the Indian subcontinent from antiquity onwards as suggested by the Kama Sutra period. The term more commonly advocated by social workers and transgender community members themselves is khwaja sira (Urdu: خواجہ سرا) and can identify the individual as a transsexual person, transgender person (khusras), cross-dresser (zenanas) or eunuch (narnbans). In India also, transgender people have been given the status of third gender and are protected as per the law despite the social ostracism. In Pakistan and Bangladesh, the hijras are officially recognized as third gender by the government, being neither completely male nor female. In different areas of Pakistan and India, transgender people are also known as Aravani, Aruvani or Jagappa. Hijra (for translations, see ) is a term used in South Asia – particularly in India and Pakistan – to refer to trans women (male-to-female transgender individuals).
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