In Southern India’s Karnataka, Maharashtra and Andhara Pradesh, Hindu goddess Yellamma has been worshipped for millenia. Her transgendered/gay male devotees are known as jogappas.

Jogappas wear the same clothes and ornaments as married Indian women- saris, mangal sutras (black and gold necklaces), green bangles, toe rings and a scarlet powder line along the main hair parting.

Jogappas are consecrated to Yellamma’s service through marriage-like ordination rituals, when beaded red and white moti strings are fastened around their necks. They become adept at holy song, dance, maintenance of Yellamma’s temples and veneration of her statue. They live off alms from the faithful, and provide anointed blessings to the followers of the goddess.

Their consecration protects them from fear, stigma and marginalisation which would otherwise be their lot as khotis (effeminate gay men), given that India still hasn’t repealed Section 377 of its colonial-era Penal Code, which still criminalises gay sex. Jogappa status provides sanctuary for Yellamma’s transgender adherents in the aforementioned areas of that vast country, whose lives might otherwise be hellish. In Gay Times, British photojournalist Jackie Dewe Matthews conducted a most informative series of photoportraits amongst the jogappa of one village, Singli.

Recommended:

Jackie Dewe Matthews: “Mixed Blessings” Gay Times 356 (July 2008): 90-95: http://www.gaytimes.co.uk