PESHAWAR: A 22-year-old woman on Friday moved the Peshawar High Court seeking permission to undergo the sex reassignment surgery (SRS) to become a man.

Kainat Murad filed the petition saying she suffers from gender dysphoria, a condition in which the feelings of one’s biological and psychological identity are opposite to one’s biological sex and therefore, she has problems like depression, anxiety and insomnia, which could only be treated through the SRS.

She said she was the only child of her parents, while her father has been suffering from paralysis for over a decade and that she was unable to earn a livelihood for family.

The petitioner said the violation of women’s rights was very common in the underdeveloped and developing countries and that women couldn’t move freely from home to workplace.

Insists permission will prevent legal complications

She said she had been living a life of a male person since childhood as she loved to play sports, wore men’s clothes and was friends with men whom she played cricket with.

The petitioner claimed that she rode motorcycle and all her hobbies were men’s.

She requested the court to direct the hospital directors of the three major public sector hospitals of Peshawar to provide free treatment to her for changing sex from a woman to a man by experts in the province for SRS.

She prayed the court to direct the respondents, including Nadra chairman, to change her name in the official records to Mohammad Kaif.

The petitioner claimed that she was advised by doctors to approach the high court for permission to undergo the SRS to prevent legal complications.

The petition was filed through advocate Saifullah Muhib Kakakhel.

The respondents in the petition are the federal government through secretary of the federal secretariat, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government through its chief secretary, Nadra chairman, and hospital directors of Khyber Teaching Hospital, Peshawar, Hayatabad Medical Complex and Lady Reading Hospital.

The petitioner claimed that her condition was called gender dysphoria, a condition in which the feelings of one’s biological and psychological identity was opposite to one’s biological sex and as a result, she suffered from depression, anxiety and insomnia, which could only be treated through the SRS.

She said women were not even safe at their workplace and are sexually harassed, humiliated and exploited on ground of their sex.

The petitioner claimed that very few women had come forward and lodged complaints before the forums constituted under the Protection against Harassment of Women at Work Place Act, 2010.

She said it was her legal and constitutional right to live life of her choice and change her sex from female to male by undergoing the required surgery.

Highlighting importance of her petition, the petitioner said it was the first ever case in KP and the court would be hearing and adjudicating it to lay down a law which would permit not only a person suffering from genetically as well by psychological diseases which could only be cured by SRS to change his/her gender but also transgender would get benefit out of it.

She said she belonged to a poor family and won’t be able to afford private treatment and therefore, the court should direct the government hospitals for treatment.

Published in Dawn, November 24th, 2018