PIL seeks COVID-19 cash relief of ₹4,000 for transgender persons without ration cards

Litigant also insists on holding special vaccination camps for them

Transgender rights activist Grace Banu has filed a public interest litigation (PIL) petition in the Madras High Court seeking a direction to the State government to provide the COVID-19 relief amount of ₹4,000 even to transgender persons who do not possess ration cards. The litigant also insisted upon holding special camps to vaccinate transgender persons after dispelling all their doubts regarding the supposed adverse effects of vaccination. The PIL petition is expected to be listed before the first Division Bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy on Thursday. In an affidavit, filed through her counsel C. Prabhu, the litigant claimed that there were more than 50,000 transgender persons in the State though the available government data shows that there were only 11,449 transgender persons of whom 2,541 had been issued with ration cards.