Bombay High Court (HC) bench headed by Justice A.S. Oka and M.S. Sanklecha was hearing a petition filed by a 29-year old transgender who has asked the state government to take steps to include a column for transgenders to change the name in the Gazette.
The petitioner's application to the Directorate of Government to change the name was rejected thrice. The petitioner was born as a woman but started identifying herself as a transgender from 2014. Thus, when she applied for an application to change her name, the application was rejected.
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In November 2018, the application was rejected because relevant documents weren't attached. Next month, the application was rejected on the grounds that no reason for seeking such name change was stated in the application, whereas, the third rejection came in January 2019 without citing any reason.
The court will have the next hearing on June 14. The judges said that the issues covered in the petition should be converted in Public Interest Litigation (PIL)
Notably, Public Interest Litigation is directly filed by an individual or group of people in the Supreme Court of India and High Courts. The person who is filing the petition must not have any personal interest in the litigation, this petition is accepted by the court only if there is an interest of large public involved.
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