The Kozhikode Corporation has refused the request of a transgender couple to have their names recorded under “parent” instead of “father” and “mother” in the birth certificate of their child. Zahhad, a 23-year-old trans man, and Ziya Paval, a 22-year-old trans woman, who became biological parents this year, moved the Kerala High Court asking it to direct the authorities to issue a fresh birth certificate mentioning their correct gender identities. The Corporation made its stand known in a counter affidavit submitted at the court in response to the petition filed by the couple.
A copy of the birth certificate was accessed by TNM. In it, the names of Ziya and Zahhad are wrongly referred to as father and mother respectively. While the Corporation has used the names of both of them, it has put them in the wrong category based on the sex assigned to them at birth. However, the Corporation claimed that the birth certificate mentioned the couple’s names as parents and their demand to “mask” their names is not maintainable.
In the counter affidavit, the Corporation said that the writ petition is not maintainable “either in law or on facts”. Stating that a birth certificate was issued to the baby with the names of Zahhad and Ziya shown as “parents”, the Corporation said that the petitioners had claimed to “mask” their names. “The claim of petitioners 1 and 2 that their names need to be masked from the birth certificate is misconceived in so far as there is no provision either under the Registration of Births and Deaths Act or under the Rules framed by the State Government thereunder whereby the names of the parents could be masked in the birth certificate of the child born to them,” the Corporation said, explaining why the couple’s request was denied. It further said that the couple were “not entitled” to the reliefs that they sought and requested the court to dismiss the petition.
Appearing for the couple, advocate Padma Lakshmi argued that their demand was not to mask their names, but to mention their names as parents. The case is scheduled to be heard in the last week of October.
Zahhad had temporarily stopped his hormone therapy to be able to conceive, so as to fulfil the couple’s wish to become parents. The couple decided to be biological parents after other options failed them. Soon after the child was born, they had spoken to the hospital authorities about incorporating their correct gender identity on the newborn’s birth certificate and other documents. However, when the Kozhikode Corporation registered the child’s birth on February 17, 2023, the father’s name was recorded as ‘Ziya Paval (Transgender)’ and the mother’s name as ‘Zahhad (Transgender)’.
Read: Why this Kerala transgender couple decided to get pregnant