Tamil Nadu Government Acts On Protecting LGBTQIA Community

The Tamil Nadu government on Friday informed the Madras High Court that it has taken various measures for the welfare of the members of the LGBTQIA+ community.

The court was hearing a petition filed by Sudha Sundararajan, who sought a directive from the state government to ensure that all the members of the LGBTQIA+ community and their family members should be given full protection from any form of discrimination in educational institutions.

Justice N Anand Venkatesh lauded the Commissionerate of School Education for taking effective steps in this regard. The court also directed that the Commissionerate should ensure that all schools have separate toilets for transgender students and their parents.

On October 27, the State Planning Commission presented a draft policy for LGBTQIA+ before Chief Minister M.K. Stalin. Subsequently, the policy was forwarded to the Social Welfare and Women Empowerment department on November 15 for further action.

The Director of Social Welfare conducted a virtual meeting with all stakeholders on the subject on December 1 and submitted a report to the government on December 6.

Since public comments had to be invited and considered before finalizing the policy, the government urged the court to defer the hearing on the petition for eight weeks to enable the department to complete the process.

As far as the statutory rules to be framed under the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act of 2019 were concerned, the judge was informed that the process of publishing the draft rules in the gazette and inviting suggestions had been completed and that the rules would be notified by the end of this month.

As per the draft rules formulated by the commission, transgender persons who have acquired gender reassignment surgery would be eligible to enroll in government schools and be given access to other facilities such as hostels and playgrounds.

The commission has also recommended that the curriculum in schools be modified to include issues related to transgender rights.