Transgender person gets licence after 15 years of driving

RAWALPINDI: Islamabad traffic police issued a driving licence to Ali Laila, a leader of the transgender community, on Monday—fifteen years after she first started driving a car.

Laila, who is the president of the Awaz Shemale foundation in Rawalpindi, said her father taught her how to drive in 2000. She said she has been regularly driving in the twin cities without a licence for fifteen years now.

Islamabad police said they issued the licence after administering all practical driving tests.

This was the first time that police has issued a driving licence to a transgender person in the federal capital.

Laila was issued a national identity card with gender marked ‘X’ on the directives of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

Later, Islamabad Inspector General of Police (IGP) Muhammad Amir Zulfiqar Khan met Laila at his office. The IGP said that police in the federal capital would now also strive to resolve issues faced by the transgender community on a priority basis.

In March this year, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police issued driving licences to 30 transgender persons based on their self-assumed gender identity and existing Computerised National Identity Cards (CNIC) documents.

Farzana Jan, a rights activist, who leads the transgender alliance TransAction in KP, was the first transgender person to receive a Computerised National Identity Card (CNIC) with gender marked 'X'.