A week and a half ago I shared the story of Shivi, a transman who is a student at Cal-Berkeley and whose parents tried to arrange a marriage for him with a man in India, to "fix his sexuality." (Parents traffic their child to India as attempted cure for the trans). Though Shivi was born in India, he has lived in the US since the age of three.

When last we saw, Shivi (who only uses the one name) was stuck in India because his mother had stolen his passport, green card and cellphone, and returned to the US with his siblings). His father, a researcher in the US, tried to enroll him as a girl at Dayalbagh University in Agra. But Shivi got access to her grandparents internet and contacted friends in the US who put him in touch with the LGBT NGO Nazarya. Members of Nazaraya helped Shivi escape from Agra and go to Delhi, where he filed a petition with the Delhi High Court claiming he had been wronged by his parents. The High Court found in his favor and granted Shivi an order of protection.

Meanwhile his father filed a claim with police in Uttar Pradesh that Shivi had been kidnapped...and then proceeded to direct the UP police to harass Nazarya members.

Yesterday Shivi got relief from the High Court. Through the High Court's auspices, Shivi's parents consented to return his passport and other documents, which his mother surrendered. He received his passport, his green card, 10,000 rupees and US $300. Shivi then expressed his happiness that he would soon be able to return to his girlfriend and neurobiology studies in the US.

The court also ordered Shivi's parents to aid his studies. This too was accepted by the parents, with some conditions.

Shivi also expressed gratitude to NGO Nazarya.

The court has given me my freedom back. Now I will be going back to the US. I will get back to my studies there and live with my girlfriend. My mother agreed to provide me financial help in my studies on a few conditions, which I am okay with.

Gender identity and sexual preference go to the core of self-determination, the Delhi high court noted on Monday, coming to the rescue of a US-based NRI transgender forcibly brought to India by her parents so that she could be "reformed". Justice Siddharth Mridul allowed Shivani Bhat to immediately return to the US and ordered her parents to arrange a return air ticket. Applauding Shivani as a "braveheart", the court observed transgenders have all along faced "harassment, violence and ridicule" due to their gender identity and lived on the fringes of society. Referring to the Supreme Court verdict of 2014, the court made it clear that "time has come to bring them to the mainstream" to put an end to their trauma, agony and pain.

"Prejudice" against transgenders is "so rampant and so authoritative that even families fall prey to its all pervasive pressure". It even quoted Rabindranath Tagore's verse, 'Go not to the temple to light candles before the altar of God, First remove the darkness of sin from your heart'.

Shivani (19), who wants to assume a male identity with the name Shivi, said she would return to the US, which offered a better "support system for people like us".

--NYOOOZ