One-third quota for women in Indian legislative bodies remains a pipe dream with the additional step needed to implement the Bill, that was unanimously passed in 2023, failing to succeed in the Lok Sabha. The law cannot be implemented until a new census is completed and additional Lok Sabha seats assigned based on its results. The Opposition, concentrated in the non-Hindi belt, bitterly opposes this move, arguing it will penalise the developed states who have more effectively curbed population growth.
But let’s leave the blame game aside. What merits a debate is the larger issue of gender equity and leadership positions for women in government and private bodies, including Rotary. At RI, as Rotary President-elect Olayinka Babalola said in his interview to me (Page 12), to get more women into Rotary “we have to make our environment more inclusive, support women and give them opportunities to thrive. I was on the RI Board, when for the first time in 2018, it took the decision that about 30 per cent of our leadership has to be female. And every director is supposed to make that happen.” It is encouraging that Rotary’s current female membership is around 27 per cent, considering women had been excluded till 1987, when the US Supreme Court intervened to secure Sylvia Whitlock’s membership in a Rotary club.
If women had to fight a battle to get into a service organisation like Rotary, imagine how tough it is for them to enter Parliaments across the world. In India, the 2024 general election saw 74 women MPs elected, four less than in the previous House. This is barely 14 per cent of the 543-member House, and not even halfway to the one-third mark that the quota envisages.
So what’s the scene like elsewhere? In the world’s most powerful nation, the US, women’s representation at the topmost government level has been dismal. For its first 130 years in existence, the American Senate had no female members! Until 1920, few women ran for the Senate, and until the 1990s, very few were elected, largely because women had no voting rights in many states! Today, in a House of 100, there are 26 women Senators, accounting for an impressive 26 per cent, until you consider that only 64 women in total have ever served in the US Senate throughout its entire history! And the country is yet to elect a female President!
Those occupying a pride of place in women’s parliamentary representation are the Nordic countries — Sweden, Iceland, Finland, Norway and Denmark. As of 2023, these nations had 40–50 per cent women parliamentarians. Interestingly, the women in these countries largely get elected by the political parties prioritising women candidates, rather than through any legislatives quota system.
Most political systems frown on women’s quota saying it compromises competence, but this is hardly true. As RIPE Babalola indicates in his interview: Give women opportunities, create an enabling environment, make them comfortable… and you will find women leaders!
Rasheeda Bhagat