Chhattisgarh to recruit transgenders as cops

We are set to recruit them if they pass a mandatory written exam and physical test

PAWAN DEO, Addtl DGP

Chhattisgarh police will hire transgender constables in the next couple of months as part of the state’s recruitment policy and deploy them to combat Maoist extremists whenever required.

The state government has asked police to hire transgender people in accordance with a Supreme Court judgment.

“We are set to recruit them if they pass a mandatory written exam and physical test,” said Pawan Deo, the state’s additional director general of police (recruitment), on Thursday. In 2014, the Supreme Court declared transgender people as the “third gender” and ruled that they have equal privilege over the fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution. Chhattisgarh police propose to recruit about 35,000 constables from each of the state’s 27 districts, of which 17 are reeling from Maoist insurgency.

“Since constables are district-level cadre, it is possible a transgender recruit will have to fight Maoists if that person is hired from a Maoistaffected area,” a senior officer in the police headquarters

said.

The department is working out the physical parameters that will applicable for transgender applicants.

According to an IPS officer supervising the recruitment process, experts were being consulted to fix the physical standards such as height and chest measurement. The age limit for all applicants is 28 years.

Chhattisgarh’s transgender community falls under the other backward class (OBC) category, a status that guarantees 14% reservation in education and government jobs. The transgender applicants can avail themselves of the reservation.

The state’s move is viewed as a watershed to mainstream the transgender people, who are often referred to as eunuchs or hijras and forced to live on the fringes of society and face discrimination in jobs and services such as health and education.