The Karnataka State Government is one of the first states in India to take a major step in providing 1% horizontal reservations to transpersons in the civil services department. The state government notified the division bench headed by CJ Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and J. Suraj Govindaraj that it has amended the Karnataka Civil Services (General Recruitment) Rules, 1977. The Amended Rules, 2021 were notified on 13th May 2021. The State Government did not receive any objection to the Draft Rules, so they released a final notification on 6^th July, 2021.

Karnataka Civil Services (General Recruitment) (Amendment) Rules, 2021 inserted Rule 9(1D) which states that all the direct recruitments for the posts will provide for 1% horizontal reservation to the transgender candidates apart from General Merit, Schedule Caste, Schedule Tribe and Other Backward Castes reservations. In case there are no registrations for transpersons, the vacant seats will be allotted to males or females from the same category. The notification also states that the ‘Appointing Authority’ should provide for a separate column of “others” along with “male” and “female” for ease of transpersons selection of genders while filing recruitment forms. The appointing authorities are also not to depict any discriminative behavior in the appointments towards transgender persons.  

– Written by Hamda Arfeen