Justice M Dhandapani of the Madras high court faced the question that lay at the heart of the case: Can a transgender person be treated as a “single person” under Section 57(3) of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015? Justice Dhandapani said his hands were tied as adoption regulations classify applicants strictly as male or female; a transgender person falls into neither category.
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Madras High Court Denies Transgender Police Officer’s Adoption Plea, Highlighting Gaps in India’s Adoption Laws
Srimathi Venkatachari / NOV 09, 2025, 23:47 IST
Madras high court rejects Prithika Yashini’s adoption plea, exposing gender gaps in India’s adoption system
Srimathi Venkatachari
When K Prithika Yashini, India’s first transgender sub-Inspector of Police, applied to adopt a child, it was more than a personal wish. It was an assertion that the right to nurture, to love and to build a family should not depend on gender.
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But her application was turned down by the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA). The reason? India’s adoption laws still do not recognise transgender persons as eligible parents.
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On Oct 7, Justice M Dhandapani of the Madras high court faced the question that lay at the heart of the case: Can a transgender person be treated as a “single person” under Section 57(3) of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015?
Justice Dhandapani said his hands were tied as adoption regulations classify applicants strictly as male or female; a transgender person falls into neither category.
The statute, he said, leaves no room for interpretation.
“In the absence of a clear legislative mandate, the plea of the petitioner cannot be considered,” the court observed, dismissing the petition.
Yet the judgment was not without compassion. The court acknowledged Yashini’s courage and granted her liberty to approach the Union govt for suitable amendments, an implicit reminder that inclusion is a legislative duty, not merely a judicial hope.
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This case is a mirror held up to Indian law. Eleven years after NALSA, and seven years after Navtej Johar vs Union of India (2018), which affirmed the dignity of queer lives, the machinery of adoption remains caught in gender’s old arithmetic.
The result is paradoxical. A transgender woman who protects citizens as a police officer cannot yet protect a child as a mother. Her uniform commands respect, but her womanhood still awaits legal recognition.
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At stake is not only the right to adopt but the right to belong. Parenthood is one of the deepest expressions of human dignity, a facet of life that Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution protect.
To deny that right based on gender identity is to keep equality trapped in rhetoric. The judgment, while legally correct, exposes a policy vacuum. It tells lawmakers: the Constitution has already spoken — the statutes must now listen.
Section 57(3) of the Juvenile Justice Act is broad: “A single or divorced person can also adopt.”
Yet the Adoption Regulations (2022) that operationalise the law speak in a narrow binary: A single female may adopt a child of any gender; a single male may not adopt a girl child.
The word transgender appears nowhere. The omission reflects a system still uncomfortable with identities that defy its checkboxes.
Yashini’s counsel argued that the phrase “single person” must include transgender persons, drawing strength from NALSA vs Union of India (2014), where Supreme Court recognised the “third gender” as equal citizens under the Constitution.
If a transgender person is a “person” in law, they reasoned, there is no logic in excluding them from parenthood.
The Union of India, however, stood by the letter of the law. The rules, it said, are gender-specific; any expansion must come from Parliament, not the judiciary.
Legislative reform is overdue. The Juvenile Justice Act and the adoption regulations must explicitly recognise transgender and non-binary persons as eligi
