Give all transgenders free ration irrespective of white card status: Telangana HC

Hyderabad: In the wake of Covid-19 pandemic, the Telangana High Court has ordered that the state should ensure free supply of essential commodities to transgenders even if they don’t have ration cards.

The HC has also ordered that the court should provide medicines, including HIV medication, hormone therapy medications, diabetes and others free of cost to transgenders from the PHCs and government hospitals.

In the order, the court said: “The state government should ensure that these commodities are given to the members of the transgender community free of cost and without insisting on the production of ration card/white card, etc. The report shall be submitted by the learned Advocate General on or before May 08, 2020.”

The division bench, headed by Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice

A. Abhishek Reddy, has directed Advocate General B.S. Prasad to submit a report with information on number of transgenders living in major cities of the state, the concrete steps being taken by the state government to ensure that the transgender community has availability of food grains, consumable items and medicines as per their need and requirements.

These apart, the court also asked for information on the number of NGOs with which the government is co-ordinating in order to ensure that all the essential commodities do reach the transgender community and it also directed the state to provide LPG cylinders, Aarogyasri government medical insurance and waiving of electricity bills for six months for transgenders.