Reservation of Seats for Women in Parliament

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It is believed that reservation of seats for Women in Parliament would lead to gender equality in Indian Parliament, resulting in the women empowerment as a whole. Historically, the Women Bill’s supporters say, women are deprived in India. Increased political participation of Indian women will help them fight the abuse, discrimination, and inequality women suffer from in India.

I think, the women should be empowered at the grass root level through various programmes so that they can equally complete the males for getting tickets to contest election. Then there won’t be any need for their reservation. They will themselves have the calibre to fill up 33% seats in the parliament.

It is true that many prominent politicians will not be able to contest election in the years ahead as their constituency may be reserved for the woman candidates. But what if they put forward their wives as contestants in election and remain themselves in the backdrop as the actual decision maker. Will it not be like the Laloo-Rabri episode? Besides, there is no guarantee that the female Member of Parliament will think more of the women of our country. Improvement of the ordinary women of our country is the need of the day, not just the empowerment of a few privileged ones. I feel Women reservation bill is just a political weapon it has nothing to do with elevating her status in the society.

It has to be understood that unless we change the basic social attitude which cultivates gender inequality and gender bias we would not be able to achieve much in terms of women empowerment in India. There are many laws and there have been many amendments that have been carried out to end the discrimination against women and empower women in all aspects of life. But the sad part is that all these laws and amendments have become toothless as the fundamental problems lies in the attitude of the society which is highly biased against women. The only solution is for women to come together as a unifying force and initiate self-empowering actions at the ground level. Once we work towards self-empowerment through small number of infinite actions, we become aware of the ground realities and then we can think about taking further recourse towards changing the mind-set of the society which fosters gender inequality and bias.

A movement has to be build which awakens the individual self in each and every woman for creative and generative action.

About the Author

absApurva Agarwal

Apurva is pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering from Harcourt Butler Technological Institute (HBTI), Kanpur. Being from a small town in Western Uttar Pradesh, she has observed the socio-economic scenario at the grassroot level. She wants to make a meaningful impact in lives of women in India by voicing their opinions on the economic & financial issues that matter most to them, and to develop key recommendations & inputs for the policymakers.

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