MORE WOMEN IN POLITICS WILL STRENGTHEN DEMOCRACY

News: After Covid-19, the position of role of women is strengthening in the political and civic life of democracy in South Asia.

Trends of Women Role in Politics

Global level: women leaders, such as Jacinda Ardern (New Zealand), Tsai-Ing Wen (Taiwan), Sanna Marin (Finland) and KK Shailaja (Kerala) has shown superior performance in handling the pandemic.

Local level: The panchayat sarpanches and health officials such as Roorkee’s Daljit Kaur, Singhwahini’s Ritu Jaiswal and the mayor of Chandannath municipality in Nepal, Kantika Sejuwal, among many others, have also performed very well.

What are the issues?

Paradox Situation in South Asian democracy: On one side, a strong women leader such as Sirimavo Bandaranaike, Chandrika Kumaratunga, Indira Gandhi, Khaleda Zia, Sheikh Hasina, and Benazir Bhutto have been in the power in South Asia. On the other side, women’s condition in society at large, continued to be appalling.

Underrepresentation of Women in political parties as members of key decision-making bodies. For instance, India has fallen several places in the Inter-Parliamentary Union’s global ranking of women’s parliamentary presence, from 117 after the 2014 election to 143 as of January 2020. In fact, India is currently behind Pakistan (106), Bangladesh (98) and Nepal (43) and ahead of Sri Lanka (182).

Some good developments towards political empowerment of women

Strength of Women Member of Parliament in India Has Increased: Currently, women make up 14.6% of MPs (78 MPs) in the Lok Sabha. It is a historic high.

Winnability of Women Politician is high:  For example, BJP women candidates won at a strike-rate of 7% as opposed to their male counterparts at 66 per cent. Additionally, 27 of 41 women MPs were able to retain their seats as well.

Voluntary Parliamentary Quotas for Women: In the 2019 general elections, West Bengal under Mamata Banerjee and Odisha under Naveen Patnaik fielded 40 per cent and 33 per cent women candidates, respectively.

High Female Voter Turnout in 2019: Women are increasingly asserting their citizenship rights. For example, in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, women’s participation exceeded that of men for the first time.

Influence of growing turnout of women voters: For example, The TMC ran many women-centric schemes like Swasthya Sathi, Kanyashree Prakalpa and Rupashree Prakalpa, that potentially played a central role in their victory.

Suggestions for improvement

Passing of the Women’s Reservation Bill.

Inspirational From Some States like West Bengal and Odisha must be replicated in other states.

Promoting Women Voter Turnout: It could influence political parties’ programmatic priorities and improve their responsiveness to women voters’ interests, preferences, and concerns, including sexual harassment and gender-based violence.

Ramoni, a 15^th century Bengali poet, a low-caste washerwoman, sang, “I’ll not stay any longer in this land of injustice/ I’ll go to a place where there are no hellhounds”. We will need to sympathise with this which is also the voice of the present generation of women.

Source: This post is based on the article “More women in politics will strengthen democracy” published in the Indian Express on 08 March 2022