Sexual taboos confront Pakistan

Sexual taboos confront Pakistan

Since early last month when Senator Mushtaq Ahmad Khan of Jamaat-e-Islami, a staunch religious party, proposed the Senate Standing Committee on Human Rights amend the Transgender Protection Act of 2018, Pakistan's social and mainstream media swarmed with heated debate on the subject.

Pakistan, despite being a predominantly conservative society with strong Islamic inclinations, is one of only a few countries that have enacted comprehensive legislation to protect the rights of transgender people.

The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2018 reaffirms the fundamental rights of transgender people such as their right to an identity, education, healthcare, employment, access to public spaces and political participation. Most importantly, it recognises their right to live with dignity, free from harassment and discrimination.

Four years after it was promulgated, assemblies, courts and social media have suddenly started discussing it, with many religious scholars and lawmakers recently challenging it in parliament.

Meanwhile, the other constitutional bodies in Pakistan, notably the Council of Islamic Ideology and the Federal Shariat Court, which is empowered to offer their advice, both recommend asking whether this legislation aligns with Sharia, or Islamic, law.

Religious groups that criticise this law argue that The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2018 will promote same-sex marriage and homosexuality, owing to a flaw in its definition of the word "transgender". They are also concerned that it will affect Islamic hereditary laws.

The question of whether this legislation is compatible with "Islamic values" has been brought to the Federal Shariat Court, with a verdict expected in the coming weeks.

The petitioners aim to have two important provisions in the law abolished. This first focuses on who can be defined as a transgender person.

The second concerns the individual's right to be recognised according to their perception of their own sexual orientation.

This law marks a major milestone in Pakistan's voyage of acknowledging the rights of individuals whose gender identities are at odds with their biological sex, either due to an accident of birth or castration, for example.

However, the petitioners argue that granting people the right to sexual self-orientation -- as a male or female -- goes "against religion" and "opens the door to homosexuality".

They seek the formation of a medical board that would control who can seek to change their gender, rather than leaving the matter to individuals' personal identification.

Right now, the debate is focused on one point: the legal definition of "transgender".

Even a cursory look at the text of the Transgender Protection Act 2018 would reveal that the arguments espoused by its critics are technically valid.

The legislation uses the word "transgender" as an umbrella term to cover all those who are "intersex", meaning they have a combination of male and female genital features, or similar congenital ambiguities; or "eunuchs", who were designated male at birth but have since undergone a genital excision or castration; or a "transgender man" or "transgender woman", or any person whose gender identity and/or gender expression differs from social norms and cultural expectations.

The critics proposed the legislation should cover intersex people only, not eunuchs or transgenders. They believe eunuchs should be considered males, and transgenders either men and women, with such a distinction legally affixed to their name.

Critics and opponents of this law fear that letting anyone change their sex at will could pave the way for "complications" in society, such as an explosion in homosexuality and same-sex marriages, as well as the implicit challenge to long-held hereditary laws.

As of now, Pakistan's law categorically prohibits same-sex marriages. The group that is advocating on behalf of The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2018 notes that, in the past four years, there has not been a single attempt by anyone in the country to have same-sex marriage.

Regardless of the technical loopholes and heated debate, the Transgender Protection Act 2018 is still a major milestone in terms of the protection of human rights in Pakistan.

One thing that has already been achieved is peaceful debate on this serious and sensitive issue in Islamic society. This piece of legislation and the debates surrounding it mark a positive development for a relatively conservative culture.

Dr Imran Khalid is a freelance contributor based in Karachi, Pakistan.

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