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It wasn’t until 2014’s Supreme Court verdict that the people of the trans community were even recognized as the third gender. Marginalized and routinely discriminated, India’s trans community fight the daily battle of trying to fit into our country’s social narrative. Perhaps a constructive approach to resolve this regressive problem would be to facilitate employment opportunities for the community. And social enterprise PeriFerry does precisely that!
Based in Chennai, Perriferry is a social inclusion start-up working for the upliftment of the transgender community. Focusing on the “human” part of HR, they provide entrepreneurial and employment opportunities to transgenders, by identifying relevant job roles, and providing training. The name comes from the word “Periphery” which means the edge, relating to the people who are living their lives on the edge – and how as facilitators, the company acts as a ferry and helps them get to their desired destinations.
Perriferry was started by Neelam Jain in May 2017. During her stint at Goldman Sachs, Neelam had to come up with an idea for an initiative which would have a social impact as part of an internal competition and she came up with the idea of an inclusive workplace focusing on trans people in India. Eventually, she realized she was passionate about this cause and thus quit her corporate job to start working on bringing her idea into fruition.
A major part of what PeriFerry does is sensitizing workplaces to make them more diverse and inclusive. Their workshops touch upon aspects of gender identity, gender expression, diversity and inclusion as well as a transperson’s struggles and journey. The intent of the program is to normalize the position of trans people in the society. They also identify people from the transgender community who are interested in joining the mainstream workforce. After procuring their resumes, they understand their strengths, interests and the field they want to work in and thus match it to job profiles/openings. Additionally, they have training and development programs hosted by other supportive NGOs, and also have certificated training programs for learning English, communications, soft skills, computer basics etc.
Quite recently, they organized a 1500 attendees TEDx event in Chennai with a 35 member all trans crew. Their candidates have been placed in various sectors, as project managers, operations analysts, kitchen stewards and more. They have also conducted sensitization programs in companies such as SPI Cinemas, Mahindra Home Finance and more. Their website has application portals for both candidates looking for a job, and employers looking to hire.
Its both heart-warming and inspiring to see such compelling initiatives. One can truly hope to see better representation of marginalized communities through efforts made by the likes of Neelam and her team. While sometime things do seem bleak in our country, its enterprises like PeriFerry who are instilling a stronger sense of hope.
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