Transgender Pakistanis get services at support unit

Описание: (22 Jul 2021) LEAD IN:
Transgender people in Pakistan can lodge complaints and bring issues forward to a victim support unit dedicated to them.
The police-run initiative was launched to get members of the community to feel welcome and comfortable while making complaints.

STORY LINE:
Since working as a victim support officer for transgender people, Reem Sharif has helped 345 members of Pakistan's transgender community.
A transgender person herself, the 33-year-old works at the first department in Pakistan's Punjab Police that solely resolves complaints made by transgender people.
The centre was established last year and is housed in the women's police station in Punjab, Pakistan's most populous province.
Transgender people can "come to the protection centre, come to a person, who is like them, a gender diverse person. She is a transgender woman like you. She is the same as you," Sharif says.
Transgender women and men of all faiths are often publicly bullied and humiliated or even face violence in deeply conservative Pakistan, though the government has recognised them officially as a third gender.
Often disowned by their families, they resort to begging and work as wedding dancers. They often are sexually abused and end up as sex workers.
Sharif has helped 27 families accept transgender members through counselling.
"Transgenders interestingly, they were not only marginalised but they were like a targeted community both by men and women," says City Police Officer Mohammad Ahsan Younis.  
When he initially discussed the idea of the centre, there was pushback especially around involving transgender people in the police force.
But Younis managed to convince enough people to start the protection centre.
According to a 2019 Supreme Court census, the estimated population of transgender people in Pakistan is around 300,000, but the actual number could be higher.
Pakistan's recognition of a third gender was a remarkable move for the conservative country.
It was life changing for many because it allowed them to acquire identity cards, needed for everything from getting a driver's license to opening a bank account.

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