The Standing Committee on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights including HIV and AIDS (SCORA), Bangladesh Medical Students' Society (BMSS Bangladesh) with the collaboration of Bandhu Social Welfare Society organized the event 'Kinnor Kahon' to celebrate the Transgender Awareness Week and the Transgender Day of Remembrance.
On 15 November 2021, the event started with a unique live webinar on the topic 'Gender and Sex and knowing the Transgender'. Anonnya Banik, Social activist and President of Sada Kalo represented the transgender community in the webinar. Using preferred pronouns, health care of the transgender community, progress made in this sector and challenges forward were discussed in this crucial platform.
On 18 November 2021, SCORA, BMSS Bangladesh organized an outstanding activity at SOS Hermann Gmeiner College Dhaka to create awareness amongst the school and college students. The program started with a fabulous session where students were given a paper to draw the human that comes to their mind in 2 minutes. This activity was done to highlight the taboo related with drawing the reproductive parts. Then an awareness session on SRHR was taken where students were given topics related to reproductive health. Then a cartoon on Good Touch and Bad Touch was shown to explain the delicate issue properly. Students got a clear concept on sensitive issues like Gender and Sex, Bullying, Menstrual Hygiene etc. Then a brave Transgender woman Rani Chowdhury, a previous student of the school, shared her heartwarming story of being 'Rani' from 'Rana'. A beautiful dance by Rani Chowdhury and her team captivated the audience.
A milestone in this event was the Health Camp for the transgender community and a beautiful day-long session on transgender Issues on 26 November 2021 at the Euro Bangla Heart Hospital. Special Guests of the ceremony were Dr. Saiful Islam, Line Director, Directorate General of Health Services and Dr. Aftab Uddin, Chairperson, Public Health Foundation, Bangladesh. A beautiful painting on the theme 'Trans persons are super humans' was unveiled in the session. In the health Camp, people from the Hijra community could share their issues with the doctors freely without any stigma, judgement or prejudice. A session on 'Gender and Sex' was organized for the medical students. Participants learnt on gender dysphoria, transgender health, gender identity and many new things. This was a completely safe space where representatives of transgender community interacted with the medical students to draw a roadmap for safe healthcare for this stigmatized people.
The event 'Kinnor Kahon' is only the beginning of a revolution to celebrate gender identity through observing the Transgender Awareness week and Transgender Day of Remembrance. It was an absolutely enchanting moment to see everyone pledging to have a gender-neutral approach towards any issue to create an inclusive world for every human being.
Writer: Iftekhar Ahmed Sakib,
Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College, Dhaka
NORA General Assistant, BMSS Bangladesh
BDST: 1330 HRS, NOV 30, 2021
SMS
