A Class 12 Delhi student has filed a PIL in the Supreme Court demanding transgender-inclusive sex education in schools. The Court has issued notice to NCERT, Centre, and six states on the plea.
New Delhi: A new public interest litigation (PIL) has been filed in the Supreme Court asking for transgender-inclusive sex education to be made part of school curricula across India.
The petition has been filed by Kavya Mukherjee Saha, a Class 12 student from Vasant Valley School in Delhi. She has raised concern over the fact that the existing NCERT and SCERT textbooks do not provide transgender-inclusive Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE).
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The petition highlights that there is a need for binding rules and proper implementation of gender sensitisation and inclusive CSE in schools across the country.
The case came up before a bench led by Chief Justice of India BR Gavai, which heard the submissions of the petitioner’s counsel.
After hearing the matter, the Supreme Court has issued notice to NCERT, the Central government, and six state governments asking them to respond to the plea.
According to the petition, directions for inclusive education were already issued by the Supreme Court in the 2014 case of National Legal Services Authority v. Union of India, but these have still not been carried out by the government.
The plea further points out that both NCERT and several SCERTs have failed to bring in the requirements of the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019, which makes it mandatory to include transgender-inclusive education in academic curricula.
The petitioner carried out a review of textbooks across different states and found that the omission is common in almost all states. Only Kerala was found to be a partial exception.
The plea clearly mentions:
“A textbook review done by the Petitioner across States, including Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka, confirms a systemic omission (of implementation of transgender-inclusive education) with the partial exception of Kerala.”
The petition argues that this exclusion is unconstitutional as it violates Articles 14, 15, 19(1)(a), 21, and 21A of the Constitution of India. It also disregards the Directive Principles of State Policy under Articles 39(e)-(f), 46, and 51(c).
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The plea further stresses that the continued exclusion
“thereby perpetuating institutional erasure and reinforcing stigma” against transgender persons.
Because of this, the petition has requested the Court to give directions to authorities to add age-appropriate and transgender-inclusive Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) in all school curricula and textbooks.
It also asks the Court to direct the government to issue binding rules for implementing gender sensitisation programmes in every educational institution in the country.
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