February 14 is the day when couples from around the world celebrate love and romance and there is one couple who has decided to start their new journey.

A transgender couple Syama S Prabha and Manu Karthika from Kerala tied the knot at a ceremony in Edappazhanji in a traditional Hindu ceremony with the blessings of their friends and family.

Talking about marrying on Valentine’s Day, Syama said that we didn’t plan to get married on this day. Our parents believe in horoscope and the date was considered auspicious. On this day, I hope people accept all kinds of love, she continued.

The couple also wants their wedding to be the first in the state to be registered as a marriage between two transgender people under the state’s special marriage act.

On registering their marriage under transsexual identities, the couple said that they are preparing themselves for a legal battle. When asked about the reason, Manu said that though other transgenders have married in the past in Kerala, the marriages were registered under gender binary (as male or female) and not under their respective gender identities.

We have both changed our identities as transwoman and transman and it is so in all our certificates. We want to register the marriage also as transgenders. So we will be filing a PIL soon, said Syama.

The couple said that as per the Rights of Transgender Persons Bill, 2014, and Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019 they have the right to get married as transgender individuals.

They also believed that registering their marriage as transgender would inspire a majority of people in the community.

Read Also: Vikrant Massey, Sheetal Thakur tie the knot on Valentines Day; deets inside!

Manu is a transman from Thrissur and Syama is a transwoman from Thiruvananthapuram. Syama is a project officer at the Social Justice Department’s Transgender Cell, whereas Manu works as a senior HR executive at a company in Technopark. The couple met in 2010 and became friends while participating in Kerala’s LGBTQ movement. Manu proposed to Syama in 2017.

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