Much excitement was seen on Thursday among the first-time transgender voters in the Gujarat assembly elections.
In the Limbayat area of Surat, transgender persons after casting their vote at the polling station took a joint selfie. They also gave statements asking people to vote in large numbers.
This year the number of transgender voters in Gujarat has increased since the last state assembly elections. According to the Election Commission of India’s data about 702 transgender people cast their votes in the previous election and in this election number of registered transgender voters is 1,417.
The rise in transgender voters is attributed to the landmark judgment of the Supreme Court in 2014, declaring transgenders as the third gender, and also to LGBT community-based NGOs.
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On 15 April 2014 Supreme Court in the landmark case of the National Legal Services Authority vs Union Of India & Ors recognized hijras, transgender people, eunuchs, and intersex people as a ‘third gender’ in law.
Earlier in the electoral rolls, only two categories of sex were mentioned-male and female and it was depriving others of a statutory right to vote and contest elections. There is no prohibition against transgender persons for contesting election to the Parliament or State Legislature. Over the years the Government of India has taken initiatives like enrolling the transgender community in the voter’s list.
Based on the Supreme Court directions, the Union government on December 05, 2019, came out with an Act called The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019 providing transgender persons equal rights including the right to contest elections and vote.
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The activists say much has changed for transgender identity after the 2014 judgment of the Supreme Court and also by the transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act. “Most importantly, there are community-based organizations, which have worked relentlessly for this (right to contest and vote). Yes, the government for sure has contributed to the present awareness among the transgender community but it is not only government but peoples’ participation that led to an increase in the registered voters,” says an official of Lakshya Trust. The Trust Lakshya is a community-based, community-led organization that primarily works on addressing and advocating the social, economic, legal, psychological, spiritual, and health aspects of sexual minorities, (gay, bisexual and transgender population) in Gujarat.
The official said Chief Election Commission’s office in Gujarat approached the Lakshya Trust in Rajkot showing a desire to work with the trust for enrolling transgender people as voters.
Later a meeting was held at Ahmedabad between the ECI officials and three transgender community representatives of the Lakshya Trust, one each from Baroda, Surat, and Rajkot. After the meeting, orders were issued by the ECI to the district authorities about speeding up the process of enrolling transgender voters.
The transgender activists in the meeting suggested that a number of transgender people don’t have proper documentation including social security benefit cards, and identity cards. “We urged the government to streamline the process. We had voter ID camps at different locations in Surat, Rajkot, and Ahmedabad. In one camp there were more than 200 people who registered themselves as voters,” the Lakshya Trust official says. “These camps were organized very quickly at different places and that was the reason that transgender people registered themselves as voters in good numbers,” says the official.
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The camps were a success as community-based organizations like Lakshya Trust facilitated them. Lakshya has a strong presence in Baroda, Surat, and Rajkot. The organization is also looking at around 20-plus districts in the state and outreach in these districts, however, is not up to the mark. In places where the government has no organizational support like that of Lakshya Trust, it becomes difficult to reach out transgender community.
This year the ECI appointed a transgender person Ragini Patel as the voting awareness ambassador in Rajkot. Patel was selected as an icon to spread awareness about voting in the polls. In Surat Noori and Payal, were identified as the community leaders who become voices for the ECI to motivate the transgender community to vote. The result is there for all to see: In Surat alone, there are around 159 transgender registered voters this time as compared to 72 in 2017.
