Politics still taboo for Gujarati women

Ahmedabad: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress both officially support the Women’s Reservation Bill that provides 33 per cent reservation to women in Parliament and state assemblies. But when it comes to fielding candidates for the upcoming Gujarat assembly elections, they are nowhere close to their stand.

While BJP has fielded 11 women candidates, the Congress has named just five candidates for the 87 Gujarat assembly seats that will go to polls on December 13 across Saurashtra, South Gujarat and four seats in western Ahmedabad district.

Gujarat Parivartan Party (GPP), a new entrant on the political battlefield this year headed by former chief minister Keshubhai Patel, has just one candidate. “Politics is still taboo for the average Gujarati woman,” said Ila Pathak, President, Gujarat Mahila Federation (GMF), an organisation working for women’s empowerment in the state.

According to studies done at Mudra Institute of Communication, “women in Gujarat are still not empowered to be in politics on their own. Most of the women who are fighting the electoral battle are mostly backed by family connections either from the parental or matrimonial side,” said a student unwilling to be named.

In the outgoing state assembly, there were only 16 women legislators, of which 15 belonged to BJP and one to the Congress. “In the last assembly elections, the BJP had fielded 22 women candidates for the 182 assembly seats, while the Congress had fielded only 14 women candidates across all the constituencies. While 29 women contested as independent candidates, the rest were fielded by registered unrecognised political parties,” the student added.

“Women are not allowed to network the way men do and if any women tries to do so, society looks down on them hence women don’t get the connect that a politician needs to fight an electoral battle,” added Pathak.

According to BJP media cell convener Jagdish Bhavsar, “we have always fielded more women candidates than any other party. BJP is committed to reservation for women and have implemented 33 per cent reservation policy in our party. it is up to the Congress to pass the bill in Parliament.”

BJP Mahila Morcha president Jayshriben Patel admits that a social change needs to be undertaken for more women to participate in the electoral battle. “As a political party we have always encouraged participation of women in politics, but society is still not fully geared to undertake this change. Despite delimitation, where many of our star candidates have to forgo their winning seat, the party has given more tickets to women candidates than any other party.”

Congress leaders are unwilling to give any credit to the BJP for giving more seats.

“A law like women reservation bill is not only implemented in numbers but also in spirit. If you look at local bodies and municipalities all over the state, Congress has larger women representatives than any other party. Today a lot more women are directly participating in the poll process who will be our candidates in future elections,” said Gujarat Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi.

“I would not attach much significance to the number of candidates that any party may have fielded, since choosing candidates is a much more complex process than deciding on the basis of gender. but the fear factor is that you would not see many Gujarati women also joining professional life or even applying for a driving license which just underlines the lack of progress in the case of empowering women,” said sociologist Samit Patel.