The provincial government of West Bengal in India has appointed a transgender woman as a college principal. Manabi Bandopadhyay will be first transgender college principal in India, probably in the world, when she takes charge of Krishnagar Women's College on June 9, the Times of India reported.
"Of course I am excited, but the media attention has left me in a tizzy. I have been flooded with calls. I understand that my achievement is a big step forward for the transgender movement in the country, but my priority is my students," Bandopadhyay told the Indian Express newspaper.
"I was the first transgender professor in West Bengal and the first transgender to complete a Ph.D. Despite getting my due honour, I have always faced threats and insults," Manabi told the Hindustan Times.
Bandopadhyay, earlier known by her family name of Somnath Banerjee, was the only son with two sisters in his family. From childhood, he felt like a woman trapped inside a male body. His orthodox Bengali family consulted a psychiatrist because of his "abnormal behavior."
Manabi, in her late 40s, teaches Bengali literature at Vivekananda Satobarshiki Mahavidyalaya in West Bengal state. She underwent a sex-change operation to become a woman in 2003, according to the Indian Express.
"All my life, I used to relate to the world like David Copperfield used to with Edward Murdstone (his cruel stepfather). In my imagination, very few people could break out of the prototype, and struggle seemed to come only my way," she said.
"There was a time when I used to ask myself, what is wrong with me? Why is it that every bone in my body cries out to be a woman?" she said.
In a landmark judgement in April last year, India's apex court recognized transgender as a third gender. The court's ruling asked the government to provide reservation to transgender people - estimated to number up to two million in India - in government jobs and education similar to minorities, according to the Hindustan Times.
