A Beauty Pageant For The Misidentified Gender

Two young women from Mumbai await their next big test, the finals of India’s first beauty pageant for trans-women, to be held in New Delhi this August. Born as male children to families in small-town India, the soul-sisters have had gender reassignment surgery and have found careers to pursue in Mumbai. And their hope now is to earn recognition for their work and talent, not just for their misidentified gender. On May 19, at the auditions in Versova, Navya and Saiba were both selected for the final round of the trans-woman beauty pageant scheduled to take place in Delhi this August.