Congress on Women's Reservation Bill: The government on Tuesday introduced a constitutional amendment bill to reserve one-third of seats in Lok Sabha and state assemblies for women. Making it the first bill to be introduced in the new Parliament building, the government said it will enable greater participation of women in policy-making.
However, the Congress, which alleged that the the Bill was its 'brain child,' said that it is nothing but a betrayal to women and girls. Congress general secretary in-charge Communications Jairam Ramesh on X said, "In a season of election jumlas, this one is the biggest of them all! A huge betrayal of the hopes of crores of Indian women and girls. As we had pointed out earlier, Modi government has not yet conducted the 2021 Decadal Census making India the only country in G20 that has failed to carry out the Census." Earlier in the day Congress' parliamentary party chief Sonia Gandhi said the women's reservation bill "is ours."
"Now it says that the reservation for women will come into effect only following the first decadal Census conducted AFTER the Women’s Reservation Bill has become an Act. When will this Census take place? The Bill also says the reservation come into effect only after the publication of the next Census and the subsequent delimitation exercise thereafter. Will the Census and delimitation be done before the 2024 elections? Basically the Bill gets the headlines today with a very vague promise of its implementation date. This is nothing but EVM - EVent Management," Ramesh added.
