ISLAMABAD: The National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) has declared that transgender registration would resume after a three-month hiatus, providing a sigh of relief to the minority community.
NADRA resumes transgender person registration
In a notification released on Monday, the decision was made to revoke Nadra’s prior order to halt the registration process in response to the Federal Shariat Court’s (FSC) ruling.
The printing of “X” National Identity Cards (NICs) for transgender people will immediately restart, according to directives from the authority, according to Rida Qazi, Nadra’s director of public engagement. According to her, the authority was legally required to print ‘X’ NICs for transgender people based on suggestions from its external legal counsel department because the case is currently before the Supreme Court.
The director of Transgender Rights Consultants Pakistan, Nayyab Ali, commended the transgender activist community for their steadfast efforts and praised Nadra’s choice.
Nadra was also praised by the National Commission for Human Rights (NCHR) for its “prompt response” in reactivating the NIC registration process for the “X” gender category.
The NCHR’s chair, Rabiya Javeri Agha, stressed the significance of having a current NIC in order to guarantee the provision of numerous rights, particularly for Pakistan’s marginalized people.
Nadra stopped the ‘X’ NIC registration for transgender people in May 2023 as a result of the FSC’s decision, which contravened the terms of the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2018.
However, the legal profession, civil society, and human rights advocates opposed this choice. Farhatullah Babar, the secretary general of the PPP, responded by challenging the FSC decision at the Supreme Court’s Shariat Appellate Bench in July. The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, which was approved by the National Assembly in 2018 and is regarded as a milestone law, was created to give transgender people legal recognition and protection and to criminalize discrimination against them in a variety of spheres of life. The Jamaat-e-Islami senator Mushtaq Ahmed and television host Orya Maqbool Jan joined transgender people Almaas Boby and Bubbly Malik as parties to lawsuits contesting the law, which the FSC considered in September 2022.
The Intersex Persons (Protection of Rights) (Amendment) Bill, 2022 attempted legal changes concurrently, focusing on specific provisions that were thought to be incompatible with Islamic and constitutional values.
The FSC overturned the law in May 2023 and determined that key provisions, such as the definitions of “gender identity” and “transgender person,” violated Sharia law. The FSC also ruled that portions pertaining to inheritance rights and the acceptance of transsexual identity were against Sharia law.
