NEW DELHI, Apr 16:
In a stinging attack, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Thursday said the Government began finishing off democracy by putting pressure on institutions, such as the Election Commission (EC) and the judiciary, but now, an “open attack” has been launched on democracy with the Constitution amendment bill.
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Participating in a debate in the Lok Sabha on three bills introduced for amendments in the women’s-quota law and setting up a delimitation commission, Priyanka Gandhi asked why can’t the Government give 33 per cent reservation to women on the current 543 seats of the Lok Sabha.
She said the bill talks of increasing the number of Lok Sabha seats to up to 850 to be done by a delimitation commission on the basis of the 2011 Census data.
“This seems fine on the surface but the real meaning comes to the fore when one carefully reads it. It smells of politics,” the Congress leader said.
She said on reading the fine print, it shows that the three members of the delimitation commission will decide the fate of the states and their representation in Parliament.
“The Government began finishing off democracy by putting pressure on institutions, such as the Election Commission, the judiciary, the media etc., but now, an open attack on democracy is being launched,” Priyanka Gandhi said.
If this Constitution amendment bill is passed in Parliament, democracy will be finished in India, she added.
The Congress MP also narrated a background to the issue of women’s reservation in legislative bodies.
“This issue is close to the heart of every woman. There is a background to this issue. The Prime Minister said this issue was blocked for 30 years. This was started by a person called Nehru. Not the Nehru they avoid so much but Motilal Nehru, who as the president of a committee prepared a list of 19 rights which were then passed as a resolution at the Karachi session of the Congress and formed the basis of giving women equal rights in Indian politics,” she said.
She said it was Rajiv Gandhi who, as the Prime Minister, brought a bill for women’s reservation in panchayats and nagarpalikas and finally, the bill for it was passed during the P V Narasimha Rao Government of the Congress.
“Under the UPA, this was passed in the Rajya Sabha but a consensus could not be reached in the Lok Sabha. In 2018, Rahul Gandhi wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, calling for women’s reservation,” Priyanka Gandhi said.
Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav accused the BJP-led Central Government of turning ‘nari’ (women) into a “nara” (slogan) for political benefits and demanded reservation for OBC and Muslim women under the proposed women’s quota law.
Participating in the debate, Yadav said the Samajwadi Party has always supported reservation for women and furthered the cause of women-led development.
All socialist leaders have believed in gender and social justice, he said.
The former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister sought to corner the ruling party on the women’s reservation issue, saying the BJP and its allies have Governments in 21 states and Union territories, but they have only one woman chief minister in Delhi.
“The Delhi Chief Minister is a half-chief minister. Does she have powers?” he asked.
The SP chief further said, “BJP has made ‘nari’ into a ‘nara’… How many BJP MLAs or MPs are women?”
He also alleged that by pushing for an early delimitation in the name of implementing the women’s reservation law, the Government is trying to delay the population Census, as well as the caste census.
“We are for women’s reservation, but we are against the BJP’s trickery,” Yadav said and added there may be a “conspiracy” by the Government in the name of women’s empowerment. (PTI)
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