The transgender community and civil society have hailed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government for introducing Pakistan’s Transgender Endowment Fund Bill 2022.
“KP government & Social Welfare Department deserve huge appreciation for making efforts to bring transgender persons into the mainstream by creating an endowment fund,” said Qamar Naseem, a transgender rights activist and Program Manager of Blue Veins (an organization leading the transgender rights policy campaign). In a press release, Qamar Nasim observed that the decision will help them escape the vicious cycle of poverty. “It is encouraging that the government is listening. The time has come to look beyond the binary gender construct of ‘male’ and ‘female’. KP will soon introduce the provincial Transgender Protection Bill 2022,” he added.
It merits some insertions here that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa minister for the social welfare department has presented a bill for setting up an endowment fund for the welfare of transgender persons in the province.
The KP government took the lead in fulfilling the needs of the transgender community presented in this new law and became the first provincial govt in Pakistan. Section 3 of the proposed law sets up a transgender persons welfare endowment fund with an initial capital of Rs.100 million.
Under Section 4, the fund will be utilized for the welfare activities of transgender persons to bring them into the mainstream. Besides, it will also provide financial assistance and small-scale interest-free loans to transgender persons for small entrepreneurship and business development.
Nayyab Ali, internationally renowned transgender rights expert and laureate of the Franco-German Prize for Human rights & rule Law expressed her views after witnessing the proceeding of the KP Assembly and said that today is the big day in the history of Pakistan and globally that we are the first country to have two laws to protect transgender rights and their empowerment.
“I feel proud that I have also contributed to developing this legal framework after Federal Law. Now next turn will be in Sindh and Punjab provinces,” she hoped.
Farzana Jan, president of Transaction Provincial Alliance of Transgender Community said creating an endowment fund for the transgender community is huge progress and success of KP government.
