Bihar Elections: More Women Voters But There Are Less Female Legislators In Their Assembly

One of the most anticipated political battles this year - the Bihar Assembly elections are just a few weeks away.

While the election battle is heating up, a not so promising picture is emerging from the state, when it comes to women's representation.

BCCL

Cutting across parties the number of seats where women are contesting is around 30 percent. This is despite the fact that in recent times, in both 2015 assembly polls and 2019 general elections, women outnumbered men in terms of voting.

Among the main parties, BJP has named only 13 women candidates, JD (U)has 22, LJP has 23, while the Congress has 7, and ally RJD has 17.

BCCL

This is a setback for the campaign that is calling on political parties to allocate 50 per cent of their seat to women.

"Shakti - Political Power to Women," has been running citizen campaigns in Bihar for the past 3 months, pressuring political parties to field more women candidates.

According to Tara Krishnaswamy, Co-founder of Shakti, the national average for women in State Assemblies is only at 9.5%.

Women representation in state assemblies still low

"Political parties field only 8-10% of women while giving 90+% of the tickets to male candidates. State Assemblies cannot decide upon reservation of seats, only the Parliament can. Therefore, Shakti has not asked for reservation during the Bihar campaign. Instead, our volunteers have focused grassroots campaigns along with local groups and working with Panchayat leads to push forward the demand for 50% tickets to women so that voters in the state have reasonable choices for representation," she said.

BCCL

She also pointed out that in 2015, Bihar elected 28 female legislators to the assembly, which was 6 fewer than the 34 elected in 2010.

Krishnaswamy said that the biggest challenge in increasing women's representation is the refusal by political parties.

"They often cite winnability but, for example, Election Commission data for all General Elections since 1952 shows that in every single election, women had a greater winning rate than men! The patriarchal nature of parties and their refusal to share political power with women, despite it being a constitutional mandate is the biggest challenge," she said.

BCCL

Krishnaswamy said that increasing women representation will help in addressing their issues, which may get overlooked by men.

Increasing women representation need of the hour

"Women often bear primary responsibility for household water. They are the predominant farm labour, they have particular health and hygiene needs, are the targets of violent gender-based crimes and are mostly employed in the unorganised sector etc., These call for very different priorities in budgeting, law-making and policies that can only change with a critical mass (33-50%) women in decision making politics. Political equality of women is also a constitutional promise. The reason it is called out, in addition to social and economic equality is because of the massive power it wields in shaping the destiny of millions of people, and the state itself. Leaving out half the talent in this process is depriving the country itself," she said.

BCCL

In the current election, both rural and urban Bihari women have a distinct set of issues that is neither being bandied by parties nor media. Women's employment, women's safety women's education, health are their top demands.

She also pointed out that rural women are more likely to rely on party symbols, long-standing politicians and word of mouth, while urban women have a choice to access information about elections and candidates through communication devices.