Everyone in the transgender community in Puducherry cast their vote in the Assembly elections 2016 held on Monday. The official figure of the transgender population in Puducherry is 87, while the NGO working with transgender community claims that there are 280.
Even as they enthusiastically cast their votes, the transgender community in Puducherry was disappointed over being identified as a female in the voter slips. “All the transgenders in Puducherry have voted. But, many of us have received the voters slip identifying us as female instead of transgender. In such cases, the official data of the number of female and transgender voters would go wrong,” said K. Sheethal of Sahodaran, an NGO working with transgender community.
Sheethal added that they had fought to be recognised as the third gender. While the voters’ identity card recognises them as transgenders, the voters’ list and slip provide a wrong identification.
She added that even the official figure of election commission indicating that there were only 87 transgenders was wrong. “The Sahodaran NGO had carried out a count and found that there were 280 transgenders living in Puducherry. If the Election Commission commits this mistake even in the voters’ list, the real count of transgenders and their polling percentage will not be correct,” said Sheethal.
While some were recognised as transgenders in both the voters’ ID and voters’ list, others were identified as female in the voters’ list. This has caused a lot of resentment among the transgenders not only in Puducherry but also in Tamil Nadu. “We are discussing with transgender community in Tamil Nadu. Once the election results are announced, we will take up this issue with the EC,” she said.
