Women given a raw deal by all political parties

Only 9% of the candidates in the fray are women

LUCKNOW: Despite talk of the need for greater representation and women’s empowerment by major political parties, women candidates account for a paltry 9% of the candidates in the fray up to the fifth phase of the Uttar Pradesh assembly election, according to the data released by UP Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

“We analysed the affidavits of 3,660 out of the 3,683 candidates up to phase five of UP elections and the number of women contestants in the fray is just 338 or 9%,” said Sanjay Singh, coordinator of the UPEW and ADR. There is only one third gender contender in the fray.

“The women representation comes down to a mere 7% if you take into account the number of females in the fray for the fifth phase only,” Singh said, adding that there was a huge gap between political rhetoric and ground reality. Of the 612 contestants vying for a berth, 569 are men and 43 women candidates.

With major political parties tightfisted in distributing ticket to the members of the fair sex, it comes as no surprise that a large number of women are fighting as independent candidates. Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) may be a strong contender in UP elections, but it fares poorly when it comes to giving ticket to women. The BSP has fielded just two women nominees in the fifth phase. The Congress under Sonia Gandhi occupies the same position by putting up two women contestants, although it is not contesting on all the 53 seats going to hustings in the fifth phase on February 27.

While Samajwadi Party (SP) fares a shade a better with three women nominee, it is the BJP which takes the cake among major political parties by giving tickets to six women. While it is not immediately clear how many women candidates in UP polls have connections to political families, a study by ADR for 2014 Lok Sabha election had revealed that 69.5% all women members of Parliament were from family of politicians. “If you look at the assets of those in fray, it becomes evident that irrespective of the gender, political parties have preferred those with deep pockets,” said Singh.

Two women figure on the list of top 10 candidates with highest assets prepared by the advocacy group for the fifth phase. Ameeta Singh, Congress candidate from Amethi, occupies the second position with declared assets of over Rs 36 crore followed by BJP nominee Garima Singh from Amethi with assets of over Rs 24 crore. In percentage terms, the candidacy of women hasn’t changed significantly over the past three parliamentary elections. In 2004, national parties gave 8.14% of their tickets to women. This went up slightly to 8.26% in 2009 and again fell to just 8% in Lok Sabha polls.