Govt to provide house for transgender
24 March 2023
Staff Reporter :
The government has taken initiative for providing housing for transgender with a view to developing their life-standard, said Dr Muktar Hossain, Director of the Social Safety Net programme of the Department of Social Service under Social Welfare Ministry.
"We are planning to set up high rising buildings at Dhaka and Sylhet primarily for the transgender to resolve their housing crisis and to promote their life-standard," he said while speaking at advocacy meeting organized by a private NGO Light House in cooperation with the USAID at its head office in the city on Thursday.
Claiming that the government is very much keen to resolve problems of the transgender, he said, "Along with various steps, the government will arrange need-based training programe to employ the special people of the country".
Besides, the Social Service Department is planning recruiting transgender in its office at least 0.5 per cent of the total staffs, the Muktar added.
He also urged all to consider them as human and citizen of the country instead of neglecting them.
Harun-Or-Rashid, CEO of the Light House, Dr Fatema Shabnam, Sexual and Reproductive Health Specialist of Pathfinder International and Supreme Court lawyer Kazi Tamanna Ferdous, among others, spoke on the occasion.
The officials of the Light House placed some proposals including providing Identification Number, stipend for educating them, step to add them in financial activities, ensuring social security, arranging motivational programmes and merit-based employment.
As per population census-2022, the country has 12,629 (6346 in urban area and 6283 in rural area) transgender people, although the participants claimed the actual number is over 1,20,000.
