PATNA: A transgender social activist has written to chief minister Nitish Kumar on April 10, objecting to the state government categorising them as a ‘caste’, instead of gender, triggering a fresh controversy to Bihar’s caste-based survey, 2022, the second round of which is scheduled to be held from April 15 to May 15.
Reshma Prasad, founder secretary of Dostana Safar, which espouses the concerns of members from the third gender community, in her letter to the CM, requested him to issue orders to mention TG as a gender; remove its reference as a caste, and to allow them to specify their caste at birth, along with their TG identity, during the survey.
While mentioning TG as a caste under backward class (BC), the state government has given castes in Bihar separate numerical codes for use during the month-long exercise, and allotted members of the third gender a caste code of 22 in the list of a total of 215 codes. This includes 112 extremely backward castes (EBC), 30 BC, seven forward castes, 32 Scheduled Tribes and 22 Scheduled Castes among the 203 notified castes in Bihar. In addition, there are 11 other castes, which the district magistrates have reported to exist in their respective districts to the General Administration Department (GAD), the nodal department for the caste survey.
“A transgender can be SC, ST or belong to different castes in the forward or backward class category. The government cannot put them under one caste, and allot them a separate code for the purpose of caste survey,” said Prasad.
Upholding the transgender persons’ right to decide their self-identified gender, the Supreme Court in its verdict in the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) vs Union of India verdict case on April 15, 2014, had directed the Centre and state governments to grant legal recognition of their gender identity such as male, female or as third gender.
“However, the options available to choose one’s gender in the Bihar caste survey are male, female or ‘others’. There is no mention of third gender or transgender,” rued Prasad.
The apex court had then also directed the Centre and the state governments to take steps to treat TGs as socially and educationally backward classes of citizens and extend all kinds of reservation in cases of admission in educational institutions and for public appointments.
“After the NALSA ruling, the same year Bihar notified the TGs under BC category, and made them eligible for 12% quota benefit under it. Since the state government extended the benefit of BC quota to TG, they have been taken as a separate caste under the BC category for the caste survey,” said a GAD official who did not wish to be named, given the political sensitivity of the survey.
“I am a Yadav by caste. I should be given the Yadav caste code and not that of a TG, which is my gender identity,” said Veera Yadav, a TG, who successfully contested a case in the Patna high court in 2020 for extending some benefits to members of her community that eventually prompted the state government to announce reservation (1 in 500 posts) for the third gender at the level of constables and sub-inspectors in the police department.
Yadav, however, lamented that ever since the state government had not issued any recruitment advertisement having quota for TGs.
Gyanendra Yadav, 59, associate professor of sociology in Patna’s College of Commerce, said TG was a gender identity and should not be substituted as a caste.
“There can be SC, ST, backward or forward classes among the transgender. It is not right to include them under one caste in the BC category. The government can make a separate category of class for TG and give them whatever privileges it wants, but their caste identity at birth should remain intact and not tampered with. You cannot change caste and gender identity, which one gets at birth. As such, to remove the caste identity of TG in caste survey is not right,” added Yadav.
As per the 2011 census, Bihar’s TG population was around 40,000, which was 0.039% of the total population of the state.
The HC is already hearing a case, at the pre-admission stage, challenging the caste-based survey on the ground that it was not a survey for a sample population, but a census, involving house-to-house enumeration of all people, which only the Centre could notify. The next date of hearing is on April 18.
