The Women’s Reservation Bill, which aims to reserve 33 percent of seats in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, was passed in the Rajya Sabha unanimously on September 21 with without any nays or abstentions.
As many as 215 MPs in the Rajya Sabha voted in favour of the bill, a day after it received strong support in the lower house with 454 votes .
The bill made history as it was passed unanimously without any nays or abstentions.
Opposition members supported the bill but called for the inclusion of Other Backward Classes (OBCs), SC, and ST communities in the legislation, which aims to reserve one-third of seats in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies for women.
The bill also proposes to uphold this reservation for a 15-year period, with seats designated for women undergoing rotation following each delimitation exercise.
During the Rajya Sabha’s deliberations on the bill for its consideration and passage, a heated debate ensued between Congress President and Leader of the Opposition in the House, Mallikarjun Kharge, and BJP President JP Nadda.
The main disagreement was about when the bill should become a law. The Opposition wanted it to happen before next year’s general elections.
Mallikarjun Kharge cited Kabir’s famous couplet “kal kare so aaj kar” (do tomorrow’s work today) to criticise the Bharatiya Janata Party for the delays in implementing the Women’s Reservation Bill.
The bill had passed smoothly in the Lok Sabha on September 20 during the second day of the five-day special session.
Opposition members pointed out that if the BJP government could suddenly announce demonetisation, they should be able to implement the bill quickly without waiting for a census and delimitation exercise.
In response to the Opposition’s demand for OBC reservation, JP Nadda mentioned that it was the BJP-led NDA that gave the country’s first Prime Minister from the Other Backward Classes.
“Out of 303 BJP MPs, 85 (29 percent) belong to the OBC community. Among the total 1358 MLAs, 27 percent are OBCs. As for the MLCs, 40 percent are OBCs. We have more OBC members than the total number of Congress MPs,” remarked Nadda.
He said that the BJP’s intention is not to gain any political advantage from the bill. If the party were seeking political advantage, the government would have announced its immediate implementation, Nadda added.
“The procedure being followed by the government for the bill is the only way, the shortest way, the correct way,” said the BJP’s national president.
Priyanka Chaturvedi, the Shiv Sena (UBT) MP, emphasised that reservation is not the sole method to ensure women’s representation in the House.
Criticising BJP JP Nadda, Chaturvedi said, “Our party supports this bill, but we have two concerns with it. First, in the manifestos of 2014 and 2019, it was promised to us that we would receive reservations. JP Nadda mentioned that this is the only way we can achieve reservation. I would like to point out that this isn’t the sole method to achieve representation and reservation.”
She added that the government could implement it immediately.
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