Mayawati seeks immediate implementation, asks govt to drop provisions which 'delay' women's reservation bill

Lucknow: BSP leader Mayawati on Wednesday urged the government to delink the women's reservation bill from the census and delimitation exercises that would "delay" its implementation for years, and ensure that the quota can come into being "immediately." She said certain provisions of the bill have been framed in such a manner that the benefit of the reservation would not reach women for the next 15 or 16 years, or "several elections" later.

The Centre on Tuesday introduced a constitutional amendment bill to reserve one-third of seats in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies for women, reviving a bill pending for nearly three decades because of lack of consensus among parties.

"The provisions which need to be mentioned here are that after the passage of the bill a census will be carried out in the country followed by the delimitation for Lok Sabha and state assembly constituencies," The Bahujan Samaj Party supremo, who has already extended support to the bill, said.

"This means it will not be implemented immediately," she told reporters.

It is an open fact that the census takes several years to complete, and the last one was carried out in 2011, Mayawati said.

"In such a situation, the new census will take several years and then delimitation will also take several years and only then the reservation will be implemented," the leader said.

The BSP chief accused the Centre of bringing the bill with a view to muster women votes in the state and Lok Sabha polls and not with a clear conscience.

"It is nothing more than that and the conditions kept in the bill prove this. If such is not the case, the BSP urges the government to drop these two provisions from the bill or take such steps as could help women get the benefit of reservation bill immediately." Stressing her demand for quota within quota, the politician said, "I again appeal for a separate quota for women from SC/ST category in the 33 per cent reservation. And similarly the quota of the OBC women should also be decided as they are still backward as compared to the general category women." She, however, repeated that her party will support bill even if its conditions are not met, considering women are still backward as compared to men.

The government on Tuesday introduced the Narishakti Vandan Adhiniyam, reserving 33 per cent seats for women in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies.

However, provisions in the bill state that the reservation will come into effect only after a delimitation exercise, or the redrawing of constituencies, and census.