Transgender recognition protested in Bangladesh

DHAKA: Thousands gathered at an Islamist rally staged after Friday prayers in Bangladesh’s capital, in the latest protest demanding the removal of recognition for transgender people in textbooks.

Transgender women have been the beneficiaries of growing legal recognition in the South Asian country, where they are officially recognized as a third gender.

A curriculum overhaul last year included the recognition of transgender women in textbooks.

One social sciences book narrates the story of a boy named Sharif who transitions, takes the woman’s name Sharifa, and goes to live with other transgender people.

Local police officer Zakir Hossain said up to 5,000 people joined the rally against the changes outside the national mosque in central Dhaka, which had been organized by Islami Andolan Bangladesh, one of the country’s largest Islamist parties.

“We won’t let Sharif become Sharifa,” protesters chanted, who also shouted slogans demanding Bangladesh’s sizable transgender community leave the Muslimmajority country.

Several hundred students at one of Dhaka’s leading universities had this week protested the sacking of lecturer Asif Mahtab Utsha for condemning the inclusion of transgender content in the curriculum.

Hijras, as transgender women are known across South Asia, have become increasingly visible in Bangladeshi society with the extension of legal recognition.

Several have entered Bangladeshi politics, and in 2021, a transgender woman became mayor of a rural town, a first for the country.

But the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community still faces widespread discrimination in Bangladesh.

A colonial-era law remains in place to punish gay sex with prison terms, though enforcement is rare.