Women And The Vote: Parties Propose, Patriarchy Disposes

Well-known tribal intellectual Rose Kerketta expressed her views on the question of women’s representation in politics: “Democracy and elections have become the playground for men, and they love to play the way they want. They are still working on preventing women from participating in politics because if they come forward, democracy will not only become non-violent but will also achieve its true purpose and dignity.”

Last year, the Central government approved a bill to reserve 33 per cent seats for women in Parliament and in the state assemblies. It was believed that in the wake of this bill, political parties in the states where assembly elections were held would implement the 33 per cent formula in ticket distribution.

Reality says otherwise. In the 81-seat Jharkhand Assembly election, the NDA (the Bharatiya Janata Party, the All Jharkhand Students Union and the Janata Dal United) has given tickets to 15 women while the INDIA bloc (the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal) has given tickets to 10 women. This means that in both these coalitions, 18.51 and 12.34 per cent are women, respectively. If the percentage is divided party-wise, the BJP has given tickets to 12 women candidates out of the total pool of 68 and the AJSU has given tickets to three women candidates out of 10. The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) has nominated five women out of 43 candidates, while there are five women candidates out of a total of 30 in the Congress.

Most of these women have got tickets from political parties based on their particular circumstances, like the instance of a candidate whose husband is serving a jail sentence. Many women who have been working for their parties for long were not given due consideration.

Writer Vandana Tete says that women take the lead in all the fronts. However, when the time comes to give them responsibility, the patriarchal mentality takes over. Tete questions the political parties which talk about ensuring representation to half of the population in their speeches, but fail to implement the 33 per cent formula for encouraging political participation of women. “You (society, leaders and parties) can say and do whatever you wish. However, there is no change in your behaviour towards women. You still have the patriarchal mentality that believes in the philosophy of men being superior to women, and always pity women.”

In the Jharkhand Assembly election, being held in two phases (November 13 and 20), the representation of women voters has increased to 14 per cent. Of the total 2,60,43,703 voters, 1,31,44,236 are men and 1,28,99,019 are women. In the first phase held on November 13, in 37 of the 43 seats, more women voters cast their votes than men. This is a larger turnout as compared to 2019. According to the available data, 69.04 per cent female voters and 64.24 per cent male voters cast their votes this time.

Activist Aloka Kujur says that all the political parties have neglected women while distributing tickets and have failed to fulfil their promises. Kujur questions the parties that are part of the current Jharkhand government.

She says, “Take a look at the election campaign. Kalpana Soren of the JMM has been holding the command alone. In Hemant Soren’s absence in the Lok Sabha election, she held a series of rallies and meetings and won all the five tribal reserved seats in the state. Today, she has overshadowed the BJP in the election campaign. Alone, she is more powerful than many men. But the question remains whether she has been successful in giving tickets to more women in the party. Rahul Gandhi sports the slogan that ticket sharing will be based on the strength of the party in each state. But how many tickets did the Congress give to women candidates in Jharkhand?” Kujur says that she has written letters to political parties demanding equal positions for women in the organisations and ticket distribution in the assembly according to the formula of at least 33 per cent.

Out of the 43 seats of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, women constitute only 11.6 percent. Out of the 30 Congress seats, women make up 16.6 per cent. Political observers say that even though parties offer tickets to women candidates in the elections, the representation of tribal women is negligible. Jharkhand is a tribal-dominated state, where 28 seats are reserved for the tribals. The tally of tribal women candidates: the JMM has two, the Congress one, the BJP four and the AJSU just one candidate.

Four assembly elections have been held in Jharkhand to date since its formation. Consider the number of women candidates in these elections so far: from 2005 to 2024, the number of women candidates has increased from 78 to 128; in 2005, 78 women contested the assembly election out of which three candidates won. In 2009, 107 women contested the election, out of which eight won. In 2014, Jharkhand elected 10 per cent women MLAs in its 81-member state assembly. In 2019, 10 out of 127 women candidates registered their wins.

It is worth noting that during this period, the number of male candidates remained more than 1,000. If the last two elections are taken into consideration, the number of male candidates was 1,088 in 2019 and 1,081 in 2024. As for tribal women: between 1962 and 2014, out of a total of 231 tribal women who contested elections, only 22 registered their wins and made it to the state assembly.

The figures make it clear that despite the many claims and promises political parties make, they act the same way when it comes to the representation of women. For them, representation of women is simply limited to vote bank politics.

(Translated by Kaveri Mishra)