Kathmandu. Bhumika Shrestha has been elected as Nepal’s first female transgender MP. He has been elected from the proportional list by the Rashtriya Swatantra Party. The Election Commission made the list public on Monday evening, which also includes his name.
Although before this, when Nepal held its first Constituent Assembly elections in 2008, Sunil Babu Pant was elected as Asia’s first gay MP in the Constituent Assembly, but Bhumika has become the first MP as a female transgender in the Parliament.
Bhumika herself is a transgender woman. At the time of birth he was a boy and his name was Kailash. Later she changed her look and name according to her feelings and became Bhoomika. Bhumika Shrestha was born in 1987 in Naikap, Kathmandu. Due to discrimination and humiliation in family, school and society, he had to leave studies after class 9.
In 2005, he obtained citizenship from the Kathmandu District Administration Office under the name ‘Kailash Shrestha’, in which his gender was mentioned as ‘Other’. After legal recognition of the third gender in Nepal, the system of including ‘other’ gender in citizenship was started.
Later, demanding acceptance of female identity, she initiated the Citizenship Amendment Act. He applied with proof of gender change. After this, as per the decision of the Council of Ministers on 5 April 2021, her citizenship was amended and her name ‘Bhumika Shrestha’ and gender ‘female’ were established. This is considered an important step in terms of legal recognition of transgender identity in Nepal.
Bhumika has been associated with the Blue Diamond Society for a long time and has been working for the rights of the gender and sexual minority community. While being active in this organization, he openly accepted his identity. Due to her activism, an international organization also included her in the list of the world’s top 100 youth in the field of gender equality.
She has also published a Nepali language book titled ‘Bhumika: Third Lingiko Autobiography’ based on her life experiences, which presents the story of identity, struggle and social acceptance.
Now after reaching the policy-making level, Bhumika is preparing to raise the issues of gender and sexual minority community institutionally. According to him, the Constitution of Nepal recognizes the rights of these communities through Articles 12, 18 and 42, but they have not been fully implemented.
Their priority is to make policies, rules and laws to implement these constitutional rights in practice. She says, “It is not enough to write the rights in the Constitution, a clear policy and mechanism to implement them is also necessary.”
She emphasizes on ensuring participation of these communities in education, health, employment and various bodies of the state. He also stressed the need for inclusive representation in public institutions like the Public Service Commission.
Bhumika does not want to be limited only to the gender and sexual minority community. She says that she will also raise the issues of Madhesi, Muslim, tribal tribe, disabled and other communities, because within all these communities also there are gender and sexual minorities.
“I will try to give a voice not just to one community, but to all gender and sexual minorities living within different identities,” she says.
Bhumika was earlier associated with the Nepali Congress, but later she pursued her political journey with the Rashtriya Swatantra Party, giving priority to the agenda of inclusive representation and change.
According to Bhumika, despite getting rights in the Constitution, the thinking towards gender and sexual minorities in the society has not changed completely. “Only when we reach a place of decision making will our issues be raised effectively,” she says.
She plans to continue working at the policy-making level to advance legal and policy reform as well as increase awareness and acceptance in society.
Bhumika Shrestha, who reached Parliament after a long struggle, identity battle and social campaign, has now become a powerful voice for the changing history of Nepal’s gender and sexual minority community.
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