An Uphill Battle

Transgender persons continue to face hurdles in gaining access to inheritance, adoption rights family pension and important legal documents

- Snigdhendu Bhattacharya

RANJITA Sinha, a transwoman and transgender rights activist, has been fighting to get the family pension of her deceased father from the West Bengal government for over six years now. Family pension is allowed to the dependent unmarried or widow daughter. Sinha has been claiming the right as a transgender daughter but the state police department, where her father was an officer, did not agree to her claims. She has finally decided to approach the court. The legal battle may not be easy. The Supreme Court of India in its famous 2014 judgement (National Legal Services Authority vs Union of India) held that a person has the right to identify their gender as male, female or transgender but the Transgender Persons Protection of Rights Act (TPPRA) of 2019 reduced the scope of the rights.  

“Each person’s self-defined sexual orientation and gender identity is integral to their personality,” said the apex court and ruled that no one should be forced to undergo medical procedures, including Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS), sterilisation or hormonal therapy as a requirement for legal recognition of their gender identity. 

The TPPRA defines transgender persons as “whose gender does not match with the gender assigned to that person at birth and includes transman or transwoman (whether or not such person has undergone SRS or hormone therapy or laser therapy or such other therapy), person with intersex variations, genderqueer and person having such socio-cultural identities as kinner, hijra, aravani and jogta.”