Flipkart includes its transgender customers in its Big 10 celebrations

Saturday July 22, 2017 , 3 min Read

Flipkart involved its transgender customers in celebrating the completion of ten years since its inception and made the Big 10 celebrations inclusive.

As Flipkart celebrates the completion of ten years since its inception, the e-commerce platform is celebrating July as the 'Month of the Customers'. It made the Big 10 celebrations inclusive by involving its transgender customers.

With a lot of stigma attached to being a transgender person, it is not easy for them to shop in stores or malls. Social ostracisation makes it difficult for the members of gender minority groups to even enter stores or malls in most cases.

However, the growing presence of e-tailers in modern times makes shopping easier for people of who face social exclusion. These platforms bring items of their choice to their doorsteps with just a swipe on their smartphones. It makes shopping easy and hassle-free on one hand and empowers them on the other, albeit unintentionally.

For Flipkart’s Big 10 celebrations, the idea is to promote inclusivity, to make transgender people realise they matter as customers. In an interview with YourStory, Sachin Kotangle, Head of Customer Experience Flipkart, said,

“We realised that our customer base is as diverse as the country we live in. Unless and until you touch each and every person of diverse culture in this country, you cannot actually be really successful”

Where wishes stand unbiased

The Flipkart hub situated on Wheeler Road, Bengaluru looked colourful and bright on the eve of Jul 19 as transgender people, who are members of the Aravani Art Project, came together to paint its wall. The painting was of a human face—half male and half female—emphasising the importance of the co-existence of genders and reinstating the fact that they are not polar opposites. It also represented a kid and an old person.

The message it carried was simple yet powerful—‘Where Wishes Stand Unbiased’, giving voice to the everyday discrimination faced by transgender people.

Image: (L) – The four transwomen part of the Aravani Art Project ; (R) – Shanthi Sonu and Priyanka Divaakar

Aravani Art Project is a wall art initiative that creates awareness for social causes through mural paintings in public spaces. Shanthi Sonu and Priyanka Divaakar, radio jockeys at Radioactive, were two of the transgender women who participated in the event at Flipkart. Two other transwomen Sowndharya and Kanchana travelled from Chennai to be a part of the celebration.

The Founder of the Aravani Art project Poornima Sukumar, an artist herself, started the initiative in 2016. Sadhana Prasad, designer with Flipkart, contributes to the project in her free time and it was she who brought the idea for collaboration to the table.

In an attempt at taking one step towards inclusiveness, Flipkart has also employed close to fifty delivery boys/wish masters who have hearing and speech impairment.