Kathmandu, June 23: In a landmark move, Tarakeshwor Municipality has announced a monthly allowance of Rs 5,000 for each third gender who is a permanent resident of the local level.
Presenting the municipality’s policies and programmes for the next fiscal year, 2024/25, mayor Krishna Hari Maharjan said that the allowance serves an incentive to create an enabling environment for third gender to open up in the society while building a positive attitude toward the community. “It aims to allow the third gender to open up,” he said.
The constitution has guaranteed the right to citizenship based on gender identity, equal participation in state bodies, and non-discrimination against gender and sexual minority communities. The municipality believes that the allowance means the implementation of the constitutional system.
Speaking at the 15th municipal assembly of the municipality, member of Bagmati Province Assembly Aman Maskey lauded the announcement as exemplary. “This is also what Nepal’s constitution envisages, there is poverty and lacking within the third gender community,” he said, “such a system will bring them relief, even if it is a little.”
Sunil Babu Pant, Asia’s first openly gay former parliamentarian of Nepal and executive director of a SGM organisation, Mayako Pahichan Nepal, concurred with Maskey’s praise. “The decision of the municipality is very exemplary and commendable,” he said, “It has given a new message nationally and internationally.”
