“There Are No Hijras in Nepal” and Other Provocations

Nepal is frequently invoked in discourses around gender and sexuality in South Asia because of its progressive legal protections for “third gender” (Nepali, tesrolingi) people. Nepal is consequently heralded as a “beacon” for LGBTQ+ rights and as a queer-friendly travel destination. However, transgender and queer subjectivities in Nepal remain little understood, especially so outside human rights activism and legal studies, which have dominated LGBTQ+ discourses in Nepal. This essay widens the lens through which Nepal's transgender and queer communities are engaged to consider transgender and queer subjectivities and activism through multiple intersecting lenses. This begins with problematizing the longstanding, ongoing assumption in South Asia and South Asian studies that Nepal shares the deep cultural history of third gender people widely known as hijras in India. The making of transgender and queer worlds in Nepal today are then explored through two prominent activist organizations and their respective Pride parades. Finally, several avenues for future exploration are proposed that reflect both current forms of activism and ongoing debates within Nepal's transgender and queer communities and broader conversations and practices pertaining to transgender and queer populations elsewhere in and beyond South Asia. These will further texturize and nuance discourses in and cross-pollination between South Asian studies, transgender studies, and queer studies.