Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], April 21 : Senior Congress leader Margaret Alva has backed the opposition's stance on the non-passage of the Women's Reservation Amendment Bill, alleging that the legislation was being brought specifically for the benefit of underdeveloped states under the guise of providing a reservation for women in the parliament.
The Congress leader further alleged that the BJP has no genuine intention of implementing the bill, and Alva accused the ruling party of deliberately delaying its implementation across the country.
"They said that the Lok Sabha seats will be increased by 50 percent. What is the calculation for this? Where did this come from? Whose advice did they take? Did the RSS decide this? Did the court order it? This act is being brought for the sick states. We pay taxes. But they get more benefits and grants. Now, according to their calculations, a 50 percent increase means that we have only 14 seats and they have 40 seats," said Alva.
"From the beginning, we have been asking for one-third of the Lok Sabha to be given to women. BJP does not want women's reservation. It is delaying it as much as it wants. The Congress party gave the first post of President. The Lok Sabha Speaker, the first woman Prime Minister, was it given by Modi? They are portraying that we did not have freedom until 2014. We have to effectively confront lies and misguidance," added Alva.
Alva's remarks came after Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) MP P Wilson on Saturday introduced a Constitution Amendment Bill as a Private Member's initiative, proposing reservation for women from the very next election without altering the existing strength of 543 seats in the Lok Sabha and without undertaking any delimitation of constituencies or conducting a census.
The Bill paves the way for providing reservations to women in State Legislative Assemblies, the National Capital Territory of Delhi, and the Union Territories of Puducherry and Jammu and Kashmir, again, without increasing the number of seats or conducting any delimitation or census.
"This reservation is not temporary; rather, it has been made permanent," Wilson said.
The Lok Sabha took up Constitution (One Hundred and Thirty-first Amendment) Bill, Delimitation Bill, and Union Territories Laws (Amendment) Bill together for passing.
In the division that took place on the Constitution Amendment Bill following the debate on the three bills, 298 members voted in favour and 230 against.
With Constitution Amendment Bill defeated, the government later said it did not want to pursue the two other linked bills.
The bills aimed to take the strength of Lok Sabha from 543 to 816 with 33 per cent reservation for women. The delimitation was to be carried out based on the 2011 census. The government said there will be proportionate increase in seats for all states.
Opposition parties said that they are strongly in favour of women's reservation but were against the Delimitation Bill. They called upon the government to implement the women's reservation in the existing strength of Lok Sabha.
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