It’s 1 am, long after a river of humanity flowed alongside the waters of the Sangam at the Mahakumbh in Prayagraj. A group of college students seeks blessings from Mahant Avantika Giri, hoping for exam success. Nearby, an elderly couple waits for a midnight Kali puja by an Aghori priest, while IT professionals and doctors from Bengaluru and Bengal smear themselves with ash, bare-bodied in searing cold, surrendering to the primal beats of drums in a moment of transcendence. Faith is an all-enveloping embrace at the Kinnar Akhada — a monastic order of the third sex. “We are neither men nor women but combine the best of both,” says Giri, adorned in a fiery red tika, kohled eyes and saffron robes. The Akhada welcomes people regardless of caste, religion, age or gender. “Just because we were denied legitimacy doesn’t mean we are vengeful. Sanatan Dharma is about behaviour and duty toward others. Kumbh is a metaphor for self-realisation. If you are into science, then the Earth’s magnetic field is amplified this time of the year and impacts human energies,” adds Giri, a trained Odissi dancer with a master’s in Natyashastra. Culturally and civilisationally, Kinnars have always been part of the mainstream. Mythology depicts Shiva as Ardhnarishwar (half-man, half-woman) and the Ramayana recognises them as equals to men and women. In pre-colonial India, they played vital roles in courts. However, British laws criminalised them in 1872, turning them into social outcasts — a stigma that persists today. “We’re just humans, not the ‘third sex.’ That’s why we reject societal hierarchies,” says Giri. It is this democratic ethos that is drawing the youth to the Akhada than the traditional male-dominated outfits, which are austere, disciplinarian and exclusionary, driven by male ascetics. However, the largest of them, Juna Akhada, is responding to the winds of change and has taken the Kinnar Akhada under its fold, hoping to soften its own stentorian image. Established in 2015, the Kinnar Akhada is now a safe space for queer people, advocating their rights and inclusivity. “The Supreme Court’s 2014 NALSA judgment recognised the third gender, granting us equal rights. The 2020 Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act furthered this progress. We don’t want special treatment, just respect and equity,” says Kalyani Nandgiri, the Akhada chief. Every kind of transgender gathers here to share their stories and concerns. Huddled inside her tent are members from all over India, discussing cultural performances for the Kumbh, the bhog distribution for pilgrims, education camps, the HIV awareness drives they need to space out and the content of the Instagram reels they need to put out. “We even decide what we will be wearing, how each of us will look,” says Nandgiri, running her fingers over her jewels and swishing the pallu of her silk sari. “That’s our armour and pride. The world may mistreat us but why should that stop us from celebrating life?” she asks. Each of them has a darker story of exploitation that they have bonded over. “Kinnars are very particular about completing their education because that’s the tool for mainstreaming. Still, the gaze doesn’t change. I completed my education and got a job as tech support staff in a Mumbai-based company. My roommates at the working hostel hated me, some of them sexually exploited me. But my worst experience was when my colleagues shut me up in a loo for three days…that did it. I joined an NGO working on HIV prevention. Then I signed up for the akhada, went through initiation and Vedic studies that are followed in such institutions. I found my voice in this collective spiritual entity,” says Giri. The reason Kinnars get Aghori masters to conduct their ceremonies is because they feel they understand them. Contrary to their stereotypes, Aghori renunciates do not view the world in dualistic terms, be it “dead” and “alive” or “edible” and “inedible.” They are non-judgmental and believe everything has value because they have the five elements. They elevate their minds and do not react to negative emotions. “People fear their aloofness, their austerity, their odd practices. Fact is, they are purists, most inclusive and democratic,” says Giri. Outside, as the doctors and IT engineers light the timber in the fire pit for havan puja, one wonders how men of science reconcile with faith or even do an Aghor puja. Says a software engineer from Bengaluru, who doesn’t wish to be named, “US astrophysicist Carl Sagan had said that the notion that science and spirituality are somehow mutually exclusive does a disservice to both. With faith, we are accountable to each other, to ourselves and to a higher purpose of doing even one act of selflessness. Besides, science is about interpreting my reality through evidence. Faith is about my mental strength and control, something that young people need today instead of slipping into depression.” This ash from the pit will remind them that householder or ascetic, their journey is the same.
