Three Bills Seeking Amendments In Transgender Rights' Act Referred To Standing Committee

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 3rd Oct, 2022 ) :Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrai on Monday referred three identical bills to Standing Committee on Human Rights seeking amendments in the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018.

The Parliament had enacted the Transgender Persons (Protection of Right) Act in 2018 to provide legal recognition to transgender persons and ensure that discrimination against transgender persons in various walks of life shall be punishable.

Two out of three identical bills namely the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) (Amendment) Bill, 2022 were separately moved by Senator Mohsin Aziz, Senator Syed Muhammad Sabir Shah while one was jointly sponsored by Senators Molana Abdul Ghafoor Hiaderi, Atta ur Rehman, Molvi Faiz Muhammad and Kamran Murtaza.

The introduced bills mainly focused to re-define transgender person as the phrase `transgender person' itself is not appropriate and needs to be replaced with ' Intersex Persons'. Moreover, it stressed that concept of ' self-perceived identity' is against spirit of islam, as the same does not allow any person to adopt an identity on the basis of his or her own choice, but should solely be determined on the basis of physical appearance or by a report of duty notified medical board. These bills also demanded that parents of such persons would be responsible of their upbringing rather than handing over them to others.

Chairman Standing Committee on Human Rights Senator Waliq Iqbal said that committee would review all these bills in detail and nothing would be allowed against spirit of Islam.