After languishing as a dead letter for many years, the Parliament of India has finally passed a long-debated bill which reserves a fixed quota of seats for women in the Lok Sabha (lower house of Parliament) and the state legislative assemblies. The newly-established Constitution (One Hundred and Sixth Amendment) Act was ratified by the President of India in late September.
The next phase of implementation for this significant reform requires an exercise of delimitation or the redrawing of the boundaries of constituencies for a fair reflection of population changes. Union Home Minister Amit Shah has signalled this process will occur after the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections, no later than 2026.
The newly passed Bill culminates a complex legislative journey, which began to gain momentum in 2008 with the introduction of the Women’s Reservation Bill. However, this act met with widespread resistance and failed to amass adequate support. Over the years, several attempts have been made to establish this policy, and the recent success marks a significant stride.
This new law echoes the reservation of 33% of seats at the grassroots level in India. This was established by the 73rd and 74th Constitution (Amendment) Acts, leading to positive effects such as increased women’s participation in local politics and advancing the acceptance of women’s roles in the public sphere.
This new law exhibits near-unanimous support, with only two recorded votes against it and 454 in favour in the Lok Sabha, and no opposing votes in the Rajya Sabha. The broad bipartisan enthusiasm indicates hope that this law will significantly increase the number of women in Indian politics where currently, only approximately 14 percent of lawmakers are female, significantly lower than the global average of 26.5 percent.
Despite the general positivity around the Act, concerns exist regarding the absence of a quota for OBC (Other Backward Castes) women, who also represent a significant portion of India’s populace. Furthermore, the scheduling of delimitation post-elections has raised concerns over a potential delay in implementation, even though those concerns have largely been addressed by the Home Minister’s assurance. A Joint Parliamentary Committee contemplating similar proposals had recommended such allocations to ensure proportional representation of OBCs.
The Act governs the mode of distribution whereby constituencies reserved for women will rotate every delimitation cycle, typically every ten years. A potential downside to this is that a legislator who has obtained a mandate may become ineligible for re-election in the next term if their constituency is assigned a women-only reserve.
The step is largely seen as positive by both the opposition and ruling parties, with the expectation that the act’s implementation will mirror the positive effects at the local level on women’s empowerment in the national arena.
In final analysis, the 108th Amendment to the Constitution of India represents a significant shift towards a more gender-equal representation in the country’s legislative bodies, even though questions remain about its practical implementation and potential for bias in the constituency distribution system.