By Sarah Elbeshbishi
Pakistani transgender and khwaja sira (a traditional “third gender” in Pakistani culture) youth activists had a round-table discussion with University of Maryland students, alumni and faulty members at the LGBT Equity Center on Oct. 25.
The activists shared what it’s like to be transgender in Pakistan and what their work aims to accomplish.
“The two major goals revolves around education and economic empowerment,” Irha Parishei, one of the youth activists, said during the panel. “As I told you, most of the trans community do not have the rights or do not have access to have their education and economic empowerment.”
Parishei and the other activists also discussed the passing of transgender rights law in Pakistan, something that they never thought would happen, she said.
The Pakistani parliament passed the Transgender Persons (Protections of Rights) Act in 2018, which gave its transgender citizens fundamental rights, according to NPR.
“It’s a very good thing and a very big achievement when you get a law passed in such a country which is so Islamic and has so much fundamental rules demanded in the country,” Parishei said.
The law allows Pakisanis to choose what gender will be recognized on their official documents. It also prohibits discrimination of transgender citizens, including that they can’t be deprived of the right to vote, NPR reported.
The law’s passage was the result of grassroots efforts that started in January 2017 after a senator drafted a preliminary bill for transgender rights without considering input from Pakistani’s transgender community. Activists met with the trans community and a former senator to provide feedback, according to NPR.
While the passing of law was a big accomplishment for the activists, there is still work that needs to be done.
“There are a few things we are not fine with [about] the law,” Parishei said.
Workplace harassment is one area Parishei also wants to address. The laws in place for workplace harassment don’t apply to those who are self-employed, something Parishei wants to change, she said.
The activists traveled from Pakistan for a conference in Washington, D.C., but they stopped by the university to hold the discussion panel.
“This really came about because of my colleague, Urooj Arshad, because we’ve worked with her and her organization, Advocates for Youth, a number of times in the past,” Shige Sakuri, the associate director of the Equity Center, said.
Advocates for Youth is an advocacy group that works toward securing sexual health for young people. The group “envisions a society that views sexuality as normal and healthy and treats young people as a valuable resource,” according to its website.
The organization partners with youth leaders, other organizations and allies to advocate for policies and programs that recognize young people’s rights to sexual health information.
“Because her work is with international LGBTQ youth activists mostly, she, every few years, may bring a contingent to D.C. for a leadership development opportunity and many of those times we’ve been able to partner with her to bring folks to campus,” Sakuri said.
After the panel spoke about life in Pakistan and what their advocacy entailed, they answered questions from attendees. Questions about the dating life in Pakistani and the activists’ next goals were among the questions asked.
Parishei hoped students would walk away from the discussion better understanding the process of the law’s passage and the fight it took to get there.
“[We hoped] to tell our experiences and to tell them our struggles so that they could learn from us and how we were able to bring the identity to the table and how we were able to pass the law,” Parishei said.