Women underrepresented

In a new low for women’s representation in the legislature, the 68-member Himachal Pradesh Assembly has just one woman MLA, down from four who had won in the 2017 election. Only the BJP’s Reena Kashyap was victorious among 24 female candidates, even as women accounted for a minuscule 6 per cent of the total nominees (412). The major parties went all out to woo women voters with promises such as 33 per cent reservation in government jobs and educational institutions, interest-free loans for entrepreneurs, bicycles and scooters for girl students and monthly allowance of Rs 1,500. However, when it came to ticket distribution, they largely preferred men. The BJP, the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress fielded just six, five and three women candidates, respectively. Ironically, women outnumbered men yet again in exercising their franchise in Himachal.

The picture in the Gujarat Assembly is only marginally better. Fourteen women out of 139 won in the recent election. A total of 1,621 contestants were in the fray, with women being barely 9 per cent of them. The BJP gave the ticket to 18 women as against 12 in 2017, while the Congress fielded 14, up from 10 in the last Assembly election. This increase is negligible for a state where almost half of the voters are women.

It’s obvious that political parties have been paying lip service to the Constitution (108th Amendment) Bill, 2008, which seeks to reserve one-third of all seats for women in the Lok Sabha and legislative assemblies. Though all major parties agree to the Bill in principle, they have not done much over the years to resolve the differences due to which its passage had got stalled in the Lok Sabha. Even as the Bill needs to be revived with the objective of building consensus and eventually making it a law, the stakeholders should lead the way by encouraging more women to contest elections. The dismal numbers of women in Parliament and Assemblies are reflective of deeply entrenched gender bias in politics. The ongoing tenure of Droupadi Murmu, only the second woman President of India, is a good time to reverse the unwelcome trend.

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