House panel led by BJP MP says no shame in being transgender, favours right to marriage, divorce for community
A parliamentary panel led by a BJP lawmaker has recommended exemption of transgenders from the ambit of laws criminalising homosexuality, saying the draft Bill introduced in Lok Sabha last year does not guarantee the community’s civil rights such as marriage and divorce.
The standing committee on social justice and empowerment, headed by seven-time Lok Sabha Sabha MP Ramesh Bais, tabled its report on the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill, 2016, in the Lok Sabha on Friday.
The Bill seeks to define a transgender and end discrimination against the community, whose number was estimated at 6 lakh in the 2011 census.
The report comes at a time when the BJP-led NDA government is under pressure to decriminalise homosexuality and to recognise the rights of sexual minorities.
“Transgender persons remain at risk of criminalisation under Section 377. The Bill must at the very least recognise the rights of transgender persons to partnership and marriage,” the report said.
It also called for a provision for penal action against abortions of intersex foetuses and forced surgical assignment of sex to intersex infants.
“While there is no shame in being gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or intersex or even straight, there is a most certainly shame and dishonour in being a homophobe, a transphobe and a bigot,” the report added.
The panel said the definition of transgender person will be the fulcrum of any legislation on transgender rights and welfare and the whole law would depend on the scope of this definition.
It said the proposed definition of a transgender person in the Bill is in stark contrast to global developments, where they have been granted the right to self determine and to seek benefits according to such identity.
