Congress President Sonia Gandhi wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, 21 September, saying, “I request you to take advantage of your majority in the Lok Sabha to get the Women’s Reservation Bill passed,” reported ANI.
In her letter, Gandhi recalled that the Congress and its late leader Rajiv Gandhi had first mooted the provision for quotas for women in panchayats and municipal bodies through Constitution amendment bills. Gandhi said the bills were “thwarted” by the Opposition in 1989, but were passed by both the Houses of Parliament in 1993.
Speaking to reporters in New Delhi, Congress women's wing chief Sushmita Dev questioned the alleged delay by the government in ensuring the passage of the bill in the Lok Sabha.
The ruling BJP should show that its commitment towards the legislation is not mere "symbolism", she said.
She asked Modi to assure the country’s women that the reservations would be implemented before 2019, when the next general elections will be held.
Another Congress leader, Shobha Oza, seconded Dev and said the party had collected “lakhs of signatures” from across the country and that those would be submitted to President Ram Nath Kovind.
The Modi government has been contemplating the possibility of bringing back and passing the Women’s Reservation Bill during the Winter Session of the Parliament.
According to CNN News-18, the government has started "backroom consultations" on the issue. The news channel quoted sources as saying that the party is keen on bringing the bill back. In BJP’s 2014 manifesto, the party had said that it was “committed to 33 percent reservation for women in the parliament and state assemblies, through a constitution amendment”.
Passing of the bill will mean one-third of the seats in the Parliament and state legislatures will be reserved for women.
The Women's Reservation Bill, introduced in the Parliament in 1996, lapsed thrice in the three consecutive Lok Sabhas that came to place.
However, during the UPA-II regime, the bill was passed in Rajya Sabha. This means that the bill does not have to be introduced afresh, as it has been cleared by the permanent house.
While the BJP supported the bill even in 2010, when it was the opposition party, the bill faced opposition from Samajwadi Party, Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Trinamool Congress.
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