30,000 students to rally for transgender rights on August 8

A youth coalition is organising coordinated transgender rights demonstrations across 25 cities in 25 States on August 8 under the name Hamari Awaaz. The demonstration aimed to mobilise an estimated 30,000 students in a single day of action that organisers describe as the largest transgender rights demonstration in India’s history.

The initiative is being led by Ishaan Bajaj, an 18-year-old activist who founded and runs Swayam, an LGBT+ inclusion organisation operating in 25 countries that has directly reached 40,000 people through pride events and a further 4,00,000 through digital outreach. The demonstration has two stated objectives. The first is increasing public visibility around the everyday barriers facing transgender Indians, including employment discrimination and inconsistent enforcement of the Transgender Persons Act. The second is building momentum toward a planned legal petition that the coalition intends to file with the Supreme Court following the demonstration, though the exact scope of the petition has not yet been finalised.

“This isn’t a one-day event for us. August 8 is the visible part. The infrastructure behind it is what we worked on and actually care about,” Bajaj said.