In this episode of the LAOT Podcast, Arnav Mathur speaks with Senior Advocate Jayana Kothari (Founder and Executive Director, Centre for Law and Policy Research) about the India’s highly controversial passage of the Transgender Persons (Amendment) Act, 2026.The conversation charts the turbulent legal arc of transgender rights in India, tracking the widening chasm between the transformative constitutional promises of the NALSA and Navtej Singh Johar judgments and the restrictive realities of legislative codification. Together, they analyze the 2026 Act’s elimination of the right to self-perceived gender identity, its regression toward a rigid, state-controlled medical model, and the severe legal and practical consequences of narrowing the definition of a transgender person to exclude trans men, trans women, and genderqueer individuals. They unpack the alarming privacy risks of mandatory surgical reporting, the chilling effect of new criminal provisions that threaten to penalize socio-cultural community groups, and how Judith Butler’s theories of gender performance clash with the state's insistence on a biological binary. Finally, they reflect on the cyclical, "steps forward, steps back" nature of constitutional rights litigation and the enduring resilience required to sustain the battle for equality on the ground.