India consents to allocating one-third of its parliamentary seats to women

India’s parliament approved a very important bill on Thursday. This bill will ensure that one-third of the seats in the lower house and state assemblies are reserved for women. This is a big victory for groups that have been working hard for many years to achieve better representation of women in politics.

The bill got support from many different political parties and was praised by politicians from all parts of India’s political groups. However, some people were concerned that it might still take a long time for the quota to actually be put into effect.

214 members of the upper house voted in favor of the Women’s Reservation Bill, which was proposed by prime minister Narendra Modi’s government in a special session of parliament on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the lower house gave their approval.

“A great moment in our country’s journey towards democracy. ” Modi wrote on Twitter after it got approved. “When this bill becomes law, it will make women stronger and start a new time of empowering them. ”

The bill, which was first proposed in 1996, has been tried to be passed six times but was not successful. This was sometimes because the country’s male lawmakers strongly didn’t approve of it.

In India, a country with 1. 4 billion people and the biggest democracy in the world, women account for almost half of the 950 million people eligible to vote. However, only 15% of the politicians in parliament and 10% in state assemblies are women.

Even though it was approved, this change will not be used for the next year’s general election.

It may take a long time to put the quota into practice because it relies on redrawing electoral districts, which will only occur after India’s census takes place every ten years.

The big population count that was supposed to happen in 2021 got postponed because of the coronavirus outbreak and hasn’t progressed since then.

Some people in India who are against the government’s decision were unhappy that the bill will not take effect earlier.

Sonia Gandhi, who is a leader of the Indian National Congress, said that women in India have been waiting for 13 years for a bill to pass.

“She told lawmakers in parliament that they have been asked to wait for a longer time now. ” “How much longer. ”

Rajani Patil, a Congress member, said that the party is glad that the bill was passed. However, they want the bill to be put into effect right away for the upcoming elections.

She said, “It should also have reservations for OBCs,” which means people from lower castes in India’s social hierarchy based on birth that has been around for 2,000 years. Though it was ended in 1950, it still exists in many different parts of life.

However, the approval of the bill in parliament will be considered as a positive development for Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) before the upcoming national elections next year.

India has improved on women’s issues, but it is still a country where men have more power than women.

Since it became independent in 1947, it has had one woman as its prime minister. India Gandhi was the leader of the country two times before she was killed in 1984.

India’s current President, Droupadi Murmu, was chosen for the role last year. She is only the second woman to hold this position.

Around the globe, women hold about 26% of the seats in lower house parliaments, compared to just 11% in 1995.

Currently, only six countries have managed to have 50 percent or more women in their parliament’s single or lower houses. Rwanda is in first place with 61%, then Cuba with 53%, Nicaragua with 52%, and Mexico, New Zealand, and the United Arab Emirates are all tied in second place with 50%.

23 more countries have achieved or gone above 40 percent. This includes 13 countries in Europe, six in Africa, three in Latin America and the Caribbean, and one in Asia, which is Timor Leste.

However, Taiwan is not included in the UN data. Despite this, it has the second highest number of women in its legislature in Asia, with 43 percent representation, after the UAE.