The nature of society and state has a decisive impact on the extent and
effectiveness of women’s political presence and participation. Notions of
democracy, governance and the state are often not gender neutral constructs but
are a cumulative result of both historical factors and experiences. The state
and its organizational entities reflect the same social forces as other social
organizations.
In India, where women constitute
half the population the number of women parliamentarians has never exceeded
fifteen per cent of all seats. At the state level, their membership in the
legislatures is abysmally low, lower than their numbers in the parliament. In the
recently concluded 16th Lok Sabha elections, 61 women candidates
won, which is by far the highest number of women who will have a seat in the
Indian Parliament. However, the
representation of women in Indian political institutions remains low which
signifies deep flaws in India’s political democracy.
Demand for greater political representation of
women in India
The demand for greater representation of women in political institutions
in India was not taken up in a systematic way until the setting up of the
Committee on the Status of Women in India (CSWI) in 1976. Before this the focus
of the growing women's movement had been only on improving women's
socio-economic position. In 1988, the National Perspective Plan for Women
suggested that a 30 per cent quota for women be introduced at all levels of elective
bodies. Introduced
first by the Deve Gowda Government in 1996 the women's reservation bill-
which proposes to reserve 33 per cent of seats in Parliament and State
Legislative Assemblies for women has been stuck
in legislation for the last 18 years.
Despite the lament of leaders like Sonia
Gandhi and efforts by successive governments to push the bill, the bill could
be passed only in the Rajya Sabha on 9 March, 2010 and the Lok Sabha is yet to
muster the courage or consensus to do the same.
Forms of reservation for women in other countries
While India has been unable to
translate the bill into legislation, women reservation in various forms
have been introduced in a number of other countries. Data from International
Institute for Democratic and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), Stockholm, 2014,
shows that an increasing number of countries are introducing different types of
gender quotas for public elections. Currently
97 countries apply constitutional, electoral or political party gender quotas. Considering
a number of nations across Asia and Africa, one can see that in the early 1990s
countries like Philippines, Pakistan and Bangladesh legislated quotas for
female representatives, ranging from 10 to 35 per cent of seats. (Quota
Project, International IDEA, Stockholm University and Inter- Parliamentary
Union)
The most common forms of reservation are quotas, either in the number of
seats reserved for women or the setting of a minimum share for women on the
candidate lists for elections. While setting a quota in seats regulates the
number of women getting elected to the parliament, establishing a minimum share
in the candidates list can either be a legal requirement or be written into the
statutes of individual political parties.
An analysis of the trend of women representation in
Indian Legislature speaks volumes of their significant under-representation in
political institutions in the country. In the 15th Lok Sabha, only 10
per cent of the total elected parliamentarians (59 of the 543 seats) were women.
Of the 8070 of the total candidates who contested elections, only 6.9 per cent
candidates were women.
Participation
of women in the 16th Lok Sabha Elections:
The 16th Lok Sabha has seen the highest number of
women contesting elections since the 1957. Out of the total 8,136 candidates,
668 were women, viz. 8.21 percent of the total candidates. This is an increase
of more than one per cent from the 2009 general election figure.
Interestingly, the success rate of women in the 16th
Lok Sabha elections is in fact better than that of male candidates. In the 16th
Lok Sabha elections, 61 women candidates out of 668 (i.e. 9.13 per cent of the
total women candidates) got elected to the Lok Sabha. While for the male
candidates, the success percentage was only 6.36 per cent (Of the 7,578 men who
contested the polls, 482 emerged victorious).
In terms of states performance, the interesting change was noted in West
Bengal, where the number of women winning has doubled. It now stands at 14 of
42 candidates from the state. This is followed by Uttar Pradesh, with 13 seats,
which does not show any change since 2009.
The
global experimentation with different forms of women’s reservations provides
valuable lessons for India both inspirational and an early warning, regardless
of the passage of the bill here.India ranks 113, much below Pakistan (at rank
72) and South Africa (at rank 5) in terms of percentage of women in the Lower
as well as Upper House/the Senate.
Unpreparedness
of Indian political parties
The vision and mission of several Indian political parties reveal an
inclination to increase women participation among their rank and file. However,
the challenge among Indian political parties is that such rules/constitutions
are seldom followed.
According to the Constitution of the INC, 33
percent of the seats in different Committees, 33 percent of members of the Executive
Committees, and 33 percent of the seats for the All India Congress Committee
(AICC) are to be reserved for women
This shows that Political parties, collectively, have not been able to
meet their decided benchmarks to ensure women participation.
South African experience: strong positive
externalities
With women comprising 44.8 percent of its current National Assembly, South
Africa serves as an excellent example of a successful experiment with voluntary
party quotas.The African National Congress (ANC) started discussions on
quotas for women since 1991 and presently the National Assembly of South Africa
has 43.5 percent women. The ANC’s voluntary quota for women also had
significant positive externalities on the opposition parties. While the
opposition parties did not commit themselves to quotas, the ANC’s quotas
had a spillover effect, leading to an increase in the proportion of women in
opposition parties from 14.2 percent in 1994, to an impressive 31 percent in
2009. The South African experience demonstrates, even a single party setting
voluntary quotas can have widespread positive effects on a country’s political
environment as whole. It also underscores the importance of women’s movements
within parties.
A Brookings India working paper “Women
in Party Politics” (April
2014) by S
Ravi and R. Sandhu suggests that a few measures, if applied with commitment,
can bring about a favourable change in the current scenario.
The paper also stresses that there are strong
lessons, which can help improve the design and implementation of quotas for
women, and therefore, result in better female representation in Indian
politics.
According to S Ravi and R. Sandhu, “In almost all political systems, no
matter what electoral regime, it is the political parties, not the voters that
constitute the real gatekeepers to elected offices.” Such fundamental reforms at
any party level are suggested to serve as necessary and strategic complements
to the Women’s Reservation Bill. This can ensure that the enactment of
Women’s Reservation Bill will not result in mere tokenism.
Compiled by Junty Sharma Pathak and Mahima Malik
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