:: Antara Dev Sen

Quotas are not enough... Give women real power

By Antara Dev Sen

Jun 11 : I am most disappointed that the histrionics over the Women’s Reservation Bill in Parliament was limited to the cowboys of the cowbelt. The Yadavs seem to be the most vocal opponents of the bill. Not a single Southern MP has offered to self-immolate. Only Sharad Yadav has threatened to drink poison, a la Socrates. (Curiously, this did not spark a stampede of honourable members offering him their best venom.) The charming Lalu Prasad Yadav declared that this bill was a conspiracy to finish off regional parties and prevent the empowerment of the backward. And dear old Mulayam Singh Yadav was blunt. You won’t get back in here, he warned the male MPs cheering the bill: "For all the table-thumping now, soon you will be thumping your charpoys at home!" His trusted deputy Amar Singh added later: "The careers of many established leaders will be destroyed as their seats are lost due to women’s reservation". The talk of quotas within quotas was eyewash, the bill’s opponents were driven by the fear of exclusion. And this for just ensuring that one-third of MPs are women. What would the poor dears do if women were actually given half the sky — and Parliament?

The touching insecurity of male MPs is not without reason. Socrates believed, as Mr Sharad Yadav will confirm: "Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior". We see it around us — given equal opportunity, education and support, women generally do better than men, starting right from school. Take the most recent examination results. The two CBSE toppers were girls, as were the three IAS toppers. And since 1984, the percentage of women candidates winning seats in Parliament has been consistently much higher than men. Reportedly, the average winnability of women candidates in the last five Lok Sabha elections is 12.5 per cent, as opposed to 8.3 per cent for men.

Denying women a fair chance is essential to keep the patriarchal power structure alive. So Indian women are usually not allowed to study much. About half are married off before turning 18. They are kept out of decision-making, and even what they earn is usually spent by their husbands or fathers. Empowering women politically is one decisive way to change our deeply sexist society. Women MPs have for years cut across party lines to come together in support of the Women’s Reservation Bill. This time, with the commitment of President Pratibha Patil and the Congress, the unambiguous support of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Left, it seems likely to be passed.

So why am I not delighted at the prospect? First, because I was never a fan of the bill. In 1996, when it was first tabled, it seemed like a personal insult. Plant women in the highest decision-making office in the country? There was a difference between panchayats and Parliament, for heaven’s sake. Would we be reserving ministries next? Clear the way, remove the obstacles, watch women glide in on their own steam. We don’t need no reservation, we don’t need no seat control.

As the bill aged, I mellowed. And bowed to the passion of senior MPs like the late Geeta Mukherjee. There was an urgent need to increase women’s participation in the political process and to rectify the shameful imbalance of political power. If reservation is the only way our dear politicians can get more women into Parliament, so be it. Quotas can fast-track social justice, and with an abysmally low percentage of women MPs (we have finally reached 10 per cent this year, a record) it seemed fine to jump the queue. When the quota lapses 15 years later, may the best candidates win.

Now, 13 years of debates and dithering shows that the bill will not fast-track gender justice. We should have looked at other ways of politically empowering women. Instead, we are stuck in the rut of cliched tokenism that does nothing for women’s empowerment.

To make matters worse, this week it seems like the quota will be reduced from 33.3 per cent to 20 per cent. This is unacceptable. Once there is a quota, women will not get general seats and will remain stuck in the 20 per cent seats reserved for them, chosen arbitrarily by a draw of lots.

This lottery prevents MPs from nurturing constituencies, and the electorate from rewarding or punishing their MP. Besides, men who are forced to vacate their constituency when it becomes a woman’s seat for one election would use their women relatives as placeholders. Women MPs would have to flit from one reserved constituency to another, rootless and vulnerable.

And they will be limited to fighting against other women — ushering in the age of purdah in politics. It would limit the voter’s democratic choices, instead of increasing them.

Besides, a "quotawali" could further hinder the acceptance of women as equal to men, and their legitimacy as MPs. We have always had outstanding women leaders and ministers, and this devaluing of women MPs would be a great pity.

The reason we don’t have enough women in Parliament is because political parties don’t give enough tickets to women — and often allot them weak constituencies to lose from. Take this year’s allotments. Even the Congress and BJP gave barely 10 per cent of tickets to women; the CPI(M) and the CPI, forever ranting about women’s empowerment, gave seven per cent. The Shiromani Akali Dal fared the best, 20 per cent of its tickets went to women. So the logical way would be to clear the block at this stage, instead of reserving seats.

Around the world this quota for tickets, not seats, has worked, substantially pushing up the proportion of women MPs in Sweden (47 per cent), Norway, Canada, Britain and France. But in India, parties will not give women candidates more tickets voluntarily, and it seems forcing them to do so may be unconstitutional. Since most changes in mindset are brought on not by law but by peer pressure and societal reward and punishment, I believe that carrot and stick should also work for "women-friendly" and "women-unfriendly" parties.

Parties should be categorised by both the percentage of tickets women get and the percentage of women actually elected, to make sure that the women are viable candidates from winnable seats.

For if we really want women’s empowerment, endlessly debating a flawed quota system in Parliament doesn’t work. We should fight against gender violence and focus on women’s education, health and freedoms. Electoral tickets give women freedom of opportunity. Reserved seats make them the less than equal "quotawali".

Antara Dev Sen is editor of The Little Magazine. She can be contacted at: sen@littlemag.com