Kolkata hosts job fair for transgender persons

Kolkata's Trans-Queer Rojgaar Mela promotes gender-inclusive workforce, featuring discussions on policies, hiring practices, and workplace challenges for LGBTQ+ individuals.

Kolkata hosted a Trans-Queer Rojgaar Mela (Employment Fair) to help create a more gender-inclusive workforce. It brought together a diverse community of stakeholders committed to advancing Trans-Queer inclusion in the workforce. Discussions were held on government policies supporting Trans-Queer employment, inclusive hiring practices, and strategies to overcome workplace challenges.

The event was organised by Sappho for Equality (activisit forum for lesbian, bisexual woman, and transman rights), and Misfyt (Trans Youth Foundation) to help bridge the gap between livelihood concerns of queer and transgender people and advocating for their inclusion in the mainstream workforce. Notable companies like Zomato, EY, CINI, Concentrix, Delhivery, and others were present at the event and participated in mentoring and hiring the candidates present at the fair.

Sumit Agarwal, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) advisor to Fortune 500 companies and Niti Aayog (MOC) said in his keynote address, “We are such a diverse country with diverse cultures, why can’t we accept that some people are a little different from us emotionally or physically?” He motivated the 100+ candidates and adviced them, “Don’t let people tell you what you can and can’t do. No one else can decide your journey.”

He also highlighted that it is time that Fortune 500 companies stopped speaking about which bathrooms trans people should use and make the discussion about what value these people bring to the table when they are hired in a company. He said, “Hire queer-trans people not just for the diversity quotient. Hire them because it is morally right and believe in the diversity.”

Chief Guest, Hugh Boylan - Australian Consul-General in Kolkata, in his address said that there can be no justification for excluding queer people from the workspace for their gender identity. He said, “Human rights belong to everyone, no matter who they are and who they love. Inclusion is important to help queer people reach their full economic potential. It is good business and good for the job overall market.”

Koyel Ghosh, Managing Trustee, Sappho for Equality mentioned how they themselves have worked in six different schools and had to leave each job because they were expected to dress a certain way and follow binary societal rules to be included in the system. They said that even after trans-queer people are hired by companies, they face regular problems at the workplace. Some of the problems they highlighted were, microaggressions, lack of inclusive infrastructure, transphobic-homophobic behavioural advances/remarks, lack of safeguarding policies, sexual and physical harassment, lack of awareness, and more.

Queer couple and prospective job seekers at the fair, Debanjali Dutta and Saheb Mallick, said how both faced backlash from their families because of their relationship and gender identity. They had to leave home due to a hostile situation and took refuge at the Sappho for Equality’s temporary shelter for five months. They are now looking for jobs to be economically independent, so they do not have to go back to their ancestral homes and face more hostility.