New Delhi: Over 140 lawyers, feminists and civil rights activists have petitioned President Droupadi Murmu to withhold assent to the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Amendment Bill, 2026.The joint representation, issued by the All-India Feminist Alliance and the National Alliance for Justice, Accountability and Rights — pan-India platforms associated with the National Alliance of People’s Movements — requests the president to exercise her powers under Article 111 of the Constitution to return the legislation to parliament.The signatories urge that the Bill be referred to a standing, select or joint parliamentary committee for “impartial and thorough scrutiny and extensive consultations with members of the transgender, intersex, non-binary and genderqueer communities”.The memorandum alleges the legislation was passed with “undue and unjustifiable haste” and bypasses established parliamentary procedures. According to the letter, Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment Virendra Kumar introduced the Bill via a supplementary list of business on March 13 “without affording MPs sufficient opportunity to read the Bill before its introduction,” thereby “violating the mandate of the Pre-Legislative Consultation Policy, 2014”.The Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha on March 24 despite severe opposition. The signatories note that, going against settled conventions, the finance minister’s reply to the debate on the Finance Bill was postponed to suddenly take up the Transgender Bill.It was subsequently passed in the Rajya Sabha on March 25, despite multiple calls from MPs demanding committee review.“At no point of time has the government explained the reason for the extraordinary rush with which the Bill was pushed through parliament without proper scrutiny and stakeholder consultation when widespread protests have been ongoing against the Bill,” the letter states.The signatories allege that Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Kiren Rijiju misled the Lok Sabha by claiming extensive debates and consultations had taken place.Furthermore, the letter submits that the National Council for Transgender Persons (NCTP) was not consulted prior to the amendments. According to the memorandum, NCTP members were invited to Delhi at the last minute on March 22, but the minister did not meet the Council. This prompted multiple members to resign over the process’s “severe democratic deficit”.On constitutional grounds, the activists argue the Bill violates the Supreme Court’s 2014 NALSA judgment. The representation notes: “The Bill omits Section 4(2) of the Principal Act, which guaranteed every person the right to self-perceived gender identity, thereby violating constitutional rights of citizens of India.” Instead, it introduces a new “authority”, defined as a medical board, whose recommendation a district magistrate must ‘examine’ before issuing a certificate of identity.The letter states this medical evaluation requirement directly contravenes the NALSA ruling and violates the right to bodily integrity and privacy protected under Article 21 in Puttaswamy v. Union of India.“While the Bill is presented as making implementation ‘more effective’ … the amendments will in fact exclude a vast majority of the most marginalised – economically, culturally and socially – transgender people from accessing protections and rights they are entitled to under law,” the groups further notes.The activists also raised alarms over new penal provisions under the substituted section 18.“The new penal provisions under the substituted Section 18 criminalise compelling any person to ‘outwardly present a transgender identity’,” the memorandum notes. “Read alongside the substantially narrowed definition of ‘transgender person’, these provisions effectively treat self-determined transgender identity as an outcome of ‘coercion’ or ‘deception’ rather than as a legitimate expression of personhood.”The letter warns these provisions “further risk being deployed against transgender communities and their support networks that have long functioned as informal safety nets, in the face of social and economic vulnerability and absence of state protection”.The petition further submits that the Bill severely violates the Supreme Court’s October 2025 judgment in Jane Kaushik vs. Union of India. The signatories noted that Justice (retd.) Asha Menon, chairperson of the advisory committee appointed in that case, wrote an urgent letter to the Union government asking it to withdraw the Bill, “but the government still passed it in parliament”.Murmu is yet to respond to the representation or grant assent to the contentious amendment Bill.