ISLAMABAD:The Federal Shariat Court (FSC) will hear on January 17 a set of petitions challenging the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018, for being repugnant to the Islamic injunctions.
Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) Khalid Jawed Khan will assist the court on these petitions, in which one section of the society believes that the rights of transvestites had been usurped through this law (Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018), while others believe this law is against the injunctions of Islam.
The petitions will be heard by a full bench of the FSC, comprising Chief Justice Muhammad Noor Meskanzai, Justice Dr Syed Muhammad Anwar and Justice Khadim Hussain M. Shaikh. The FSC will decide the petitions while exercising its jurisdiction under Article 203-D of the Constitution. The petitions were moved by Irfan Khan and others.
On last hearing, the court had also allowed noted TV anchor and columnist Oriya Maqbool Jan, Ayesha Mughal, a transgender lecturer, and Bubbly Malik to become parties in these petitions. These individuals have now been arrayed as petitioners in the Shariat petitions. In his petition, Oriya Maqbool Jan contended that the “self-perceived gender identity” law will give rise to the homosexuality, as, under this law, any person can change his/her gender identity by moving a simple application to the NADRA for change of his/her gender identity, despite he/she has many children.
He said change in gender identity can only be made after an examination by a competent medical board. He said since this law was enacted, about 28,000 people about 17000 males and about 11000 females, have changed their gender identity by simply moving applications to the NADRA. He said this law is absolutely against the injunctions of Islam and Shariah.
Earlier, on May 8, 2018, when PML-N central leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi was the Prime Minister, the National Assembly had enacted the Transgender Persons (Protection of Right) Act to provide legal recognition to transgender persons and prohibit discrimination and harassment.
The law also provides definition of the transgender by highlighting that transgender men, transgender women and any person whose gender identity or gender expression differs from the gender assigned at birth are eunuchs.
The law was made after the Supreme Court in Sept 25, 2012 had held that transgender persons were entitled to all rights guaranteed by the constitution and enjoyed by other members of the society.
While becoming party in the case, Orya Maqbool had submitted that since the case pertained to the fundamental rights and of public interest, thus, he will like to cite laws of 98 countries regarding the matter.
The Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) has also presented a bill in the Senate seeking an amendment in the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018, for the creation of a medical board that would recommend whether a person’s gender should change, instead of them seeking a reassignment on the basis of their personal identity.
The law, in its current state, reads: “A person recognized as transgender shall have [the] right to get himself or herself registered as per self-perceived gender identity with all government departments including, but not limited to, NADRA (National Database and Registration Authority).”
According to data shared with the Senate, 16,530 cases of gender change from male to female, 12,154 cases of female to male, 21 cases of transgender to male, nine cases of male to transgender and as many cases of transgender to female were processed over the last three years.