LAHORE: Upon receiving assurance from the Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS) that the transgender community will be included in the country’s sixth national population census under a separate gender category, the Lahore High Court on Monday disposed of a petition that had sought the enforcement of fundamental rights for the community.

Waqar Ali, identified as a member of the transgender community, had filed a writ petition through Advocate Sheraz Zaka seeking directions for a separate category of gender for Pakistan’s transgender community on their national identity cards and in the upcoming population census.

The FBS submitted its reply on Monday saying that arrangements had been made to assign a separate gender code to the transgender community in the population census scheduled to be held this year.

The reply said that a data processing technique had been developed in this regard and the census field staff would be trained on how to take count of those identified as transgender.

This would help the government ascertain the number of transgenders in the population. Summary results on which the description of the census would be received had been amended accordingly, said the reply.

The FBS litigation director told the court that the matter had been taken care of and that the court’s direction in this regard would be followed in letter and spirit.

LHC Chief Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah disposed of the petition after going through the reply.

Published in Dawn January 10th, 2017