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The Lok Sabha on Wednesday passed the Women Reservation Bill with 454 members of the Lok Sabha supporting The Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty Eighth Amendment) Bill 2023. Representatives of all political parties unanimously agreed on the need for more women representation in the country’s legislative bodies, even as many of them pointed out the absence of OBC reservation in the bill.
The Bill provides for one-third reservation to women in the Lok Sabha as well as State Assemblies. Presently, the Lok Sabha has 14.94 per cent women MPs, while 14.05 per cent women MPs make up the Rajya Sabha.
The representation of women MLAs in state assemblies, however, ranges anywhere from an abysmal zero per cent to up to 15 per cent across different states.
Which State Assemblies Have More Women MLAs
The following interactive map by The Quint shows the percentage of women MLAs across all Indian states and union territories, as per the latest assembly elections in each state.
The state with the highest percentage of women MLAs is Tripura, which elected nine women to its 60-member strong assembly in February 2023, which is 15 percent. Interestingly, there was a higher turn-out of women voters than the men, in the Tripura elections.
Most Northeastern States Fare Poorly, Mizoram at 0 per cent
However, not all northeastern states come even close to Tripura in women representation in its assemblies.
Mizoram doesn’t have a single woman in its assembly, while Nagaland has only two. Both states have a 60-member strong assembly. Until the February 2023 election, Nagaland hadn’t had a single woman MLA since it attained statehood in 1963.
Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya each have five per cent women MLAs, while Manipur has 8.3 percent women MLAs. Nagaland has only 3.3 per cent women representation in its assembly.
South Indian States Versus North Indian States
Notably, some northern and eastern Indian states fare better than the ones in south India, by and large, when it comes to women representation in state assemblies.
For instance, West Bengal, which has a 294-member assembly, has 13.7 per cent women representation, whereas, Karnataka, which has 224 members in its assembly, has 4.46 per cent women MLAs.
Chhattisgarh has 14.4 per cent women MLAs, Rajasthan has 12 per cent, and Uttar Pradesh 11.6 per cent.
Kerala has 7.86 per cent women MLAs, Tamil Nadu 5.13, Andhra Pradesh eight per cent and Telangana 5.04 per cent.
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