In indian culture transgenders, called Hijras, belong to the “third sex”, neither man nor woman.
As an offering to the Goddess Kali, they undergo the ritual emasculation, carried out in secret and without anesthesia, by the Thaaiamma, a kind of sacred midwife. Through this surgery they renounce a specific gender, as the male organ is cut off and in its place there is any reconstruction of the female organ, as it would be normal in modern surgery.
This is the reason why they are called “non-gender specific”, “third sex” or “shemales”.
Traditionally considered sacred beings as daughters and priestesses of Kali, nowadays Hijras live like outcasts, even at a lower level than the caste of Pariah, and to survive the majority of them is forced to beg and prostitution.