ON APRIL 15, TRANSGENDER PERSONS ACROSS THE COUNTRY observed the eleventh anniversary of the Supreme Court’s landmark judgement in National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) v. Union of India (2014), which paved the path to recognising the identity of transgender persons and upheld their fundamental rights. The rights envisioned have subsequently devolved into welfare schemes and approaches by various state governments, missing the larger spirit and mandate of the judgment.
I analyse the recently tabled Karnataka budget 2025-26, from the lens of social justice and equality, to assess its implications on the transgender community, whose plight remains overlooked.
Being a step ahead of the Union's Gender Budget Statement (‘GBS’), Karnataka’s 2025-26 GBS does include schemes for transgender welfare under its ambit. However, examining the 2025-26 Karnataka budget closely reveals that only Rs 5.54 crores of expenditure in schemes have been potentially geared towards transgender welfare, constituting a mere 0.005 percent of its GBS.
