A WOMAN WITHOUT PREFIXES

Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju is doing better than ever, and settling into womanhood in her own skin.

- JISHNU BANDYOPADHYAY

It’s February 7, 2019. Twenty-two-year-old Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju films herself from a hospital bed in Bangkok. Fighting through an anaesthesia induced post-op trance, she tells the camera, “It’s done. It’s actually done.” The pride in her voice and the bubbling relief it houses has nothing against the 12-hour-long procedure she’s just been through. “I feel tipsy almost. My brain is not communicating super effectively with my mouth. It’s taking a while to form sentences. My throat is fucked. My chest feels like an elephant is sitting on it,” the video continues, “but it’s done. No more penis. No more tucking. No more stuffing. It’s quite a relief. Painful…painful but such a relief.” This video series on YouTube documenting her surgical transition is how I first got to know Trinetra. Through her most intimate moments, I, along with about 5,25,800 others, had a front-row seat to a trans experience that most people never have access or exposure to.

Five years later, at