The Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal (MAT) on Wednesday held that while the plea to grant reservation for transgenders in public employment and education cannot be entertained, the government needs to take more steps for 'effective participation and meaningful inclusion of transgenders in mainstream." MAT Chairperson Justice Mridula Bhatkar, along with member Medha Gadgil, passed the order in applications seeking direction to the state government to provide 'third gender' option and reservation to transgenders in Government jobs. The panel said that while it cannot direct the reservation to applicants, certain concessions could be given to them as per the directions given by the Supreme Court in the National Legal Services Authority vs Union of India case and Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019. The panel, while hearing a plea by three applicants Arya Pujari, Vinayak Kashid and Yashwant Bhise directed that they be given required grace marks to reach cut-off marks or applicants who have reached upto 50 per cent of the total marks be considered for the posts concerned. The panel also directed the state to give relaxation to age-barred applicants who have reached upto 45 per cent marks to provide one more opportunity and its directives be implemented within six weeks. The Tribunal said that "mere identification and acknowledgment of their existence in society is not sufficient inclusion but to facilitate their appointments in Government and Public sector is inclusion in true sense." The panel noted that as of today the state government has nearly five lakh employees across the departments but "not a single transgender who has come out of closet has got a job in the Government sector. " This fact itself speaks in volume, it added. The order observed, "Transgenders are humans, citizens of our great country awaiting their inclusion in the mainstream. We have historical, mythological and cultural instances of eunuchs and their participation in political, social or cultural fields." The MAT said transgenders are people in 'minority' and 'majority forms the government. But the majority cannot suppress or ignore the rights of the marginalized section. The caliber and morality of democracy is tested on these yardsticks. Not only in India but in Western countries also sex is a taboo. Women across the world had to struggle for generations to have today’s position and yet to go ahead in respect of getting equal opportunity and equal treatment in society. The case of transgenders is worse than the case of women." Advocates Kranti LC and Kaustubh Gidh for applicants submitted that governments of Tamil Nadu, Chattisgarh, Karnataka, Jharkhand and Bihar, have given benefit of reservations to transgenders. The Maharashtra government had informed the tribunal that it would not be possible to give transgenders reservation. The MAT in November, last year had asked the government to provide an option for the third gender category in online application forms. The next month, Bombay High Court had directed the government to frame recruitment rules for transgenders. "Maharashtra has proved to be very progressive in thought and culture," the MAT said, adding that necessary measures were required from the government for transgenders to get government jobs. The Tribunal noted that Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution prohibited discrimination on the grounds of sex and getting a public job is a "handicapped race for the transgenders" due to "the negative approach of the society, family in all schools, colleges in all places at all the levels." The MAT also said in Maharashtra vertical reservation had reached 62 per cent and understood the difficulty faced by the government to give additional reservation. The panel noted that the law is an 'instrument of social engineering' which creates a mandate regulating social patten leading to equality and harmony in society and the courts "cannot ignore any problem in society" when placed before them.
