Kerala High Court's historic decision, transgender couple's child gets gender-neutral birth certificate

The Kerala High Court ordered the authorities to grant the child of the trans couple a gender-neutral certificate. It ruled that the two parents must be indicated as just 'parents,' not as 'mother' and 'father.' Judge Ziyad Rahman AA passed this ruling based on the application filed by trans man Jahad and trans woman Jiya Pawl.

Disposing of this petition, the court ordered the Kozhikode Corporation to prepare the birth certificate in Form Five. It was modified by dropping individual columns for the father's and mother's names and including the names of petitioners one and two as parents, without specifying their gender. That is, the gender is no longer to be specified for anyone in the child's birth certificate.

In their petition, the couple had alleged that the local authorities refused to amend the birth certificate of their child. The birth certificate issued by the Kozhikode Corporation recorded Jahad as the father (transgender) and Jiya as the mother (transgender). The couple welcomed their baby on February 8, 2023, at a government medical college hospital in Kozhikode, which was considered the first such case in India.

Ziyad and Jiya are a transgender couple. Jahad is a trans man (i.e., was a woman by birth, but adopted a male identity). Jiya is a trans woman (was a man by birth, but adopted a female identity). The two had initially considered adopting a child, but due to the complexity of the legal process and emotional scars, they decided to have a biological child. Jahad stopped his hormone therapy and carried the child to term.