'Once someone called me a synthetic woman'

As Karan Johar raised a storm with many bombastic confessions on his life and the mystery surrounding his sexuality deja vu of sorts for Manabi Bandyopadhyay , it was , India's first-ever transgender college principal. She said, “Karan is such a symbolic name. Like Karna, from Mahabharata, Karan is also isolated, humil iated and is enduring the same trauma like one of us.“When quizzed if Johar coming out of the closet would help others, Manabi would help others, Manabi said, “Karan has all the means and ways to come out and express himself.
It's not that easy for oth ers, you see. There are so many people, who have come to me and confessed about their sexual orien tation. But later, they backed out in front of l other people and accused me of every wrong thing possible. I have faced it all. Even the Bengali film industry is full of homosexuals and transgenders.A director l i k e Rituparno Ghosh was mimicked to no end. You might think it's a trivial matter. But trust me, it hurts!“ Manabi further explained, “A Mexican transgender was beaten to death recently. There are many, who are scared of facing the reality. It is homophobia. Looks like Karan felt the brunt of it. Our society is full of hypocrites. They will beat you to death if you decide to break the rules. But then, who creates such rules?
So many teachers and students in my college have spoken ill about me. It doesn't bother me anymore.“
So, what is the concept of love to her, we ask.Manabi said, “The word `falling' is so negative! We don't fall in love. Love happens. But for us, it is never love. People think transgenders are sex machines.Once someone called me a `synthetic woman'.To that, I had replied, `Goromer taant hote parlam na, borshar synthetic-e shoi'.“