LGBTQIA+ activists and allies in Bengaluru took to the streets on Thursday, February 27, in protest against former US President Donald Trump’s anti-transgender persons policies, warning that it could set a dangerous global precedent. Organised by the Coalition for Sex Workers, Sexual and Sexuality Minorities Rights (CSSMR), the demonstration called for international resistance against the rollback of trans rights in healthcare, education, military service, and asylum protections.
Prior to the march, transgender rights activist Akkai Padmashali, who wrote an open letter to Trump, condemning his policies as a deliberate erasure of trans identities and a threat to global LGBTQIA+ rights, addresed the gathering.
“Trump’s administration had made it clear from the start that it sought to eliminate the legal existence of transgender and non-binary people. Before coming to power, he said that the United States would only recognise two genders, and after coming to power, he made sure to implement it,” she said. She also added that the idea of two genders is a “product of patriarchy, of power, of an orthodox notion.”
Following this, the protest march took off from the Freedom Park and concluded at the state secretariat.
The Trump administration introduced policies which narrow gender into a strict male–female binary, erasing the legal identities of trans and non-binary people. It conflates sex, which refers to the biological makeup of a person, based on external or internal body features, hormones, sex chromosomes, etc., with gender, which is defined by how society perceives people, based on the norms, behaviours, and social roles associated with the sex assigned at birth.
Criticising Trump’s ban on transgender athletes and cuts to gender-affirming care as deliberate acts of exclusion, Akkai noted, “What Trump has done is bifurcate social justice itself, and that is unacceptable. Trump’s policies have dragged America, which had one of the most progressive medical systems, by several centuries,” she said.
Priyank Sukanand, Karnataka State Head of the LGBTQIA+ vertical of All India Professional Congress (AIPC), said that Trump’s policies have directly impacted transgender healthcare access in India. “The US had direct investments in LGBTQIA+ health programs here. Now, with their aid cut off, we are left depending on corporate CSR funds, which are unstable. We need a long-term legal framework to protect queer rights in India, not just foreign funding that can disappear overnight,” he pointed out.
A group of law students from the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), who were part of the protest, said that the fight against Trump’s policies is not just about trans rights, but about resisting manufactured oppression.
Aishwarya Reddy, a trans rights activist and the state secretary of the Indian Youth Congress, said that India should not assume that such policies will remain limited to the US. “When America passes a law, other countries follow. We have fought too hard in India—repealing Section 377, fighting for legal recognition—only to let these regressive ideas influence our policies,” she said.
Kumar B, a Queer activist, said the rollback of trans rights is a global trend, and the Indian government should take a clear stance against it. “Trump’s decisions don’t just hurt America—they hurt the world. We demand that the Indian government take a stand and refuse to be complicit in this global rollback of rights,” he said.