trans persons’ right to bodily autonomy or recognize their agency.85 The legislation mandates a long and arduous process for legal gender recognition, with a high degree of control and power given to a single government agency.86 In response to guidelines set in 2017, the Indian government also moved in 2023 to exclude sexual and gender-diverse persons and sex workers from donating their blood, citing “scientific evidence”.87 Activists note that this is a violation of India’s anti-discrimination laws.88 This means, that despite all of this, there have been no structural gains for queer rights sponsored by the BJP government. The alignment of certain segments of the LGBTQI+ community with the BJP’s nationalist agenda, including support for a uniform civil code that undermines Muslim Family Law, has influenced the approach to LGBTQI+ rights in India. In 2020’s Pride marches, some organizers even collaborated with the police to identify protesters who were speaking out against the antiMuslim Citizenship Amendment Act.89 STRUGGLE FOR LGBTQI+ RIGHTS In Pakistan, celebrated 2018 legislation dedicated to the protection of trans and gender-diverse persons, the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, was read as “incompatible with Islamic principles” by a federal religious court in 2023. Accordingly, the court struck down numerous sections of the law.90 The ruling has intensified existing concerns about the high levels of transphobic violence in Pakistan, where 90 percent of transgender people reportedly face physical assaults.91 The removal of key provisions from the act has led to the denial of gender self-identification, legal protection, inheritance rights, healthcare access, education, employment, housing, and social welfare for transgender 85 Knight, K. (2019). India’s Transgender Rights Law Isn’t Worth Celebrating. Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw. org/news/2019/12/05/indias-transgender-rights-law-isnt-worth-celebrating 86 Ibid. 87 Dasgupta, S. (2023). India’s government opposes blood donations by LGBT+ community by citing ‘scientific evidence’. Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/india/india-transgender-lgbt-blood-donation-b2301274.html 88 Raj, T. K. (2021). We don’t want your blood’ exclusion of Sexual Minorities from Blood Donation. Centre for Law and Policy Research. https://clpr.org.in/our-work/transgender-rights/ 89 Queerbeat. “In Modi’s India, No Structural Gains for Queer Rights, Only Symbolic Victories.” https://www.queerbeat.org/stories/in-modis-india-no-structural-gains-for-queer-rights-only-symbolic-victories 90 Amnesty International. (2023). Pakistan: Revocation of rights of transgender and gender-diverse people must be stopped. Amnesty International. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/05/pakistan-revocation-of-rights-of-transgender-and-gender-diverse-people-must-be-stopped/ 91 Riaz, M. M. A. & Awan, M. M. (2023). “Transgender rights in Pakistan: implications of Federal Shariat Court ruling”. The Lancet Psychiatry. Vol 10, No. 8, E20. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(23)00191-8 33