Transsexual and intersex people going to the polls in India will no longer have to choose between identifying themselves as male or female, now that a third category for gender has been added.
The new option—“O” for “Other”—has been added alongside the “M” and “F” choices for use by transsexual people, eunuchs, intersex people (born with indeterminate genitalia), or those who for various reasons do not identify themselves according to binary gender. Though the percentages of such people in any given community may be small, in a country of one billion—and a voting roll of more than 700 million—the raw numbers are large enough to warrant a third category.
India Adds Third Gender Option to Voting Rolls: ’Other’
