Is marriage legal for transpeople in India ?

Can a trans person get married in India? By Sriraksha V Srivastava
Marriage is an important aspect of a lot of our lives and as a trans-person, we want to have access to the same. Some of us have binary gender markers and some have non-binary markers. So is marriage legal for all of us? Sriraksha V Srivastava tells us how the marriage laws look for trans people.
Do I have the Right to Marry?
Trans people have been awarded the Right to Marry, Adopt and Property under the NALSA ACT, as we know. But there is a catch.
Personal Laws like these are usually governed through the religion of the parties by the courts.
Let’s take the case of Hindu Personal Law. The Law says that two binary adults could get married. So a Hindu man and a woman, a bride and a bridegroom can get married.
Is there a case upholding this judgement?
The case of Arun Kumar vs the Inspector General of Registration was a case where the Marriage Register denied registering the marriage between a cishet man and a Trans-woman. The case was fought before the Madras High Court and the Court upheld NALSA and said one must interpret laws. So under the Hindu Marriage ACT, under which they were getting married, one can read the bride and bridegroom under the umbrella terms of NALSA and a trans-woman is a bride.
And in the case of Mansoor Rehman where a cishet person and a trans person were getting married, the Madras High Court enlisted Police Protection for such couples.
So is a trans marriage legal?
It is legal if it is a heterosexual marriage between a cishet person and a trans person with a binary gender card.
But the legality does not stand for non-binary and trans people.
Was the Arun Kumar case because the marriage- register denied it on how they looked even though they had a binary card?
Sriraksha says that the details aren’t clear to her but the bride had gone through feminizing surgery as well as had a binary gender card. So under NALSA, they could do this legally. But the non-binary trans people are still fighting for their rights.
Can I still be in a live-in relationship?
Thanks to Section 377 and other advances in the law live-in relationships are valid. But they are not the same as a marriage, after all.
What about the Police Protection?
In cases like these, the couple faces a lot of agitation from the community and the family members. They get threats and this could easily turn into a case of honor killing. So Madras High Court, keeping all of this in mind, said that in addition to the Right to Marry, they must be safely married and hence the additional police protection.