Why the Extraordinary Rush to Pass Trans Bill 2026 Sans Public Feedback

Where legislation affects specific groups, it must be disseminated through some form of media to reach those people.

Despite its own commendable track record of participatory and inclusive lawmaking, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment bypassed the PLCP entirely with respect to the Transgender Act 2026. No public draft, no feedback window, and no recorded justification for the omission.

(Photo: Aroop Mishra/The Quint)

Ending a 45-year drought, a Private Member's Bill was unanimously passed in the Rajya Sabha in April 2015. This Bill, on the rights of the transgender persons, was passed with members of the transgender community watching the proceedings from the visitors' gallery.

In March 2026, the government introduced a Bill in Parliament, in complete secrecy, dialling the clock back on the progress made in acknowledging and upholding the rights of the transgender community.

On 13 March, after the day’s proceedings had already begun, the government brought a supplementary list of business to suddenly add to the agenda of the Lok Sabha for the introduction of the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Amendment Bill, 2026. The Bill was swiftly introduced without any objection from the members of the Opposition given there were protests going on in the House.

A Bill is only introduced in Parliament after it has been approved by the Cabinet—and Cabinet decisions are revealed to the press. However, in this case, there were no prior media reports of the Cabinet’s approval for the Bill. 

The sudden introduction of the Bill further implies that a copy of the Bill was not circulated among MPs sufficiently in advance, required as per rules of procedure of Parliament, to enable them to read, understand, and object to introduction of a Bill if required. One wonders why the government acted in such secrecy on a Bill that it claims is for the welfare of transgender persons.

Against Trans Inclusivity & Autonomy 

The anticipation of a backlash would probably explain why MPs and relevant stakeholders—including the statutory body National Council for Transgender Persons established for the very purpose of advising the government in preparation of laws and policies for the community—were kept in the dark.

The contentious Bill removes the 2019 Act's inclusive definition of a transgender person that recognised transmen, transwomen, and genderqueer individuals, regardless of whether they had undergone any medical procedure, and replaces it with a narrow list of categories. In doing so, it also excludes persons with different sexual orientations and self-perceived sexual identities that the 2014 NALSA judgment enshrined.

The Bill goes on to introduce the terms "eunuch" and "persons forced to assume a transgender identity" through medical or surgical procedures, language that pathologises and criminalises the trans community.

The Bill also introduces medical gatekeeping for identity recognition, where a certificate of identity as a transgender person will now require examination by a designated medical board headed by a chief medical officer, reversing the principle of self-identification that the 2019 Act had moved toward.

Similarly, what was once an option to obtain a revised certificate after gender reassignment surgery is now a mandate, with the medical institution required to report the surgery to the District Magistrate.

The Bill's additions on offences carry severe penalties, but frame the harms through a lens of coercion into transgender identity, casting transness itself as something done to a person, rather than something a person is.

Improper Process

The process through which the Bill was passed in both Houses of Parliament also leaves much to be desired. On 24 March 2026, the Lok Sabha was debating the Finance Bill—and the Finance Minister was scheduled to respond to the debate. After that, the Transgender Amendment Bill was listed.

However, in a rare and very unusual intervention, Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Kiren Rijiju suggested that the Finance Minister’s response to the Finance Bill be deferred to the next day—and instead the Transgender Amendment Bill be taken up and passed.

Several Opposition MPs objected to this and reiterated their demand to send the Bill to a Standing or Select Committee for proper scrutiny, analysis, and stakeholder consultations. The same demand was made by them in the meeting of the Business Advisory Committee earlier in the day.

Rijiju, however, insisted that the Bill be taken up immediately. He then claimed that extensive debate has already happened on the Bill over a one-year period, a claim for which no evidence was offered. He further claimed that a Standing Committee had already debated on this issue.

But, in a striking revelation, when Queerbeat, a media publication, contacted the chairperson and some members of the Standing Committee on Social Justice and Empowerment, under whose jurisdiction this subject matter falls, they denied having debated this issue. After the Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha, it was immediately transmitted to the Rajya Sabha and passed the very next day, by deferring the debate on the Appropriation Bill No 2, despite demands from MPs to refer the Bill to a Select Committee.

It must be noted that in the Budget Session, financial business is prioritised over everything else as it is time bound, but the government has so far offered no justification for the extraordinary rush with which the Transgender Amendment Bill was pushed by deferring financial business and despite severe opposition.

From Participatory to Top-Down Approach

This stands in complete contrast to the participatory approach with which law and policy making with respect to the rights and welfare of transgender communities has been approached so far.

In 2016, when the government, in response to the Private Member's Bill passed by the Rajya Sabha a year ago, brought its version of the Transgender Welfare Bill, it sent the same to the Standing Committee on Social Justice and Empowerment.

The committee, in turn, invited comments from general public and relevant stakeholders. It even interacted with several civil society organisations, experts as well as members of the transgender community before finalising its report.

This participatory approach was followed in the rule-making process subsequent to the enactment of the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019 as well.

When the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment operationalised the Act in 2020 through a set of Rules, it opened them for public feedback. What followed was remarkable: despite the disruption of nationwide COVID-19 lockdowns, a wide cross-section of stakeholders like community members, civil society organisations, and domain experts came together to engage with the Rules in depth.

Their feedback reflected not just broad concerns but granular attention to detail, right down to the language used in official forms. English and Hindi summaries helped ensure that communities that would be most affected could understand and respond to the procedures being proposed. Many simply shared their lived experiences—and that too proved invaluable.

In a record turnaround of just two months, the Rules were amended with 52 percent of the suggestions accepted, and new measures were added to better safeguard community rights.

The government then did something rarer still—it notified the amended draft once more and opened it for a second round of public consultation before final implementation. This was inclusive policymaking in its fullest sense as iterative, responsive, and accountable.

The foundation for this kind of inclusive lawmaking was laid in 2014. The Pre-Legislative Consultation Policy (PLCP), notified by the Ministry of Law and Justice in February 2014, requires every Central government ministry or department to publish proposed legislation in the public domain, including a draft or, in the very least, a justification, key elements, financial implications, and impact on affected people, for at least 30 days before introduction in Parliament.

Where legislation affects specific groups, it must be disseminated through print, electronic, or other media to actually reach those people. A summary of all feedback received must be compiled and shared publicly, included in the Cabinet note, and placed before the relevant Parliamentary Standing Committee.

Crucially, if a ministry chooses to skip this process, it must record explicit reasons for doing so, making non-compliance a documented, accountable act rather than a quiet omission.

Despite its own commendable track record of participatory and inclusive lawmaking, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment bypassed the PLCP entirely with respect to the 2026 amendment. No public draft, no feedback window, and no recorded justification for the omission.

This is not merely a lapse in good practice. It is a procedural violation of a Cabinet-level policy, one that the government itself had demonstrated it could honour, and had honoured, for this very community, just five years prior.

Trans Lives Pay the Price

There are costs associated with every law and policy, not just those involved in the making and implementation of a law or policy but also in the consequences it may have on the rights and lives of people. This is the reason that law and policy-making processes have procedures which deliberately provide for opportunities for interventions and reflections at multiple stages so that all possible concerns can be addressed.

Now, there are widespread protests by members of the transgender community who are anxious about how their everyday lives, their ability to access safe medical procedures and spaces will be impacted by the changes proposed in the Bill. This could have been avoided had the government held transparent and inclusive consultations with the community and understood their concerns. 

The PLCP exists precisely for this purpose. It also acts as a useful check in moments when a ministry or department moves fast on legislation that will reshape lives, and needs to be slowed down. The ministry can still rectify these errors at this stage. It can withdraw the Amendment Bill and redraft it with the community, not against it, and in full compliance with the consultation process the government has already committed to uphold.

The 2020 Rules showed us that when the state listens, policy improves. Now, 2026 has shown us what happens when it stops listening. 

(Maansi Verma is a lawyer and founder of Maadhyam, an initiative which closely tracks, analyses, and comments on parliamentary proceedings to enable critical citizen engagement with law and policy making. Afreen Azim is a lawyer and Associate Director, Operations at Civic Innovation Foundation (Civis), an organisation dedicated to institutionalising the 2014 PLCP by enabling dialogue between citizens and governments on draft laws and policies. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the author's own. The Quint does not endorse or is responsible for them.)