Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday launched a scathing attack on the opposition parties in the Lok Sabha, accusing them of creating obstacles in the early implementation of the Women’s Reservation Act. Amit Shah, who was replying to the debate in the Lok Sabha on three bills brought by the government to speed up women’s reservation, said that in 1972, the then Prime Minister first brought the Delimitation Bill, which increased the number of seats from 525 to 545, and then they were frozen.
He said that during the Emergency in 1976, the 42nd amendment was brought which stopped delimitation to retain power. “Even at that time the principal opposition party had deprived the people of the country of delimitation, and even today the same party is depriving the country of it,” he said.
Shah further said “If we implement women’s reservation on the basis of 543 seats, 13 seats in Tamil Nadu will be reserved for women and 26 seats will remain open. If we implement women’s reservation on the basis of 2011 census, the number of parliamentary seats will be reduced by 6. But we are not doing that. We are increasing the seats by 50% for every state,” Shah further said.
The Union Minister said that the women of the country are watching who is putting obstacles in their way. He said that they are ready to mention in the Bill that the number of seats for the States will be increased by 50 per cent. He said, “Some members present here have spread the misconception that Muslim women will also be given reservation. I want to clarify that the Constitution does not allow reservation on the basis of religion. If the reason for opposing this Bill is to have 50% reservation, then a Stop the proceedings for the hour, and I will bring official amendments to this bill, but first they (the opposition) will have to promise to pass the bill.”
He further said, “Out of the total 543 parliamentary seats, these five states – Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Kerala – currently account for 129 seats, which is 23.76%. After the increase of 50%, when we allocate seats for these five states, this number will increase from 129 to 195, which will represent 23.87% of the 816 seats. Will not be harmed either.”
Attacking the opposition, Shah said there should not be any North-South divide. Shah said, “To ensure that there is no dilemma in the minds of 140 crore Indians, I want to make it clear that the Narendra Modi cabinet had decided to conduct the caste census along with the 2026 census. The country should not be divided on this ‘North-South’ and ‘East-West’ divide. We should rise above this. In this Parliament, all the states and the Center The Union Territories enjoy equal rights.” He argued that the delimitation process is the only way to increase the number of seats reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, therefore opposing it would be standing against their interests.
“I assure them that if they support us for delimitation, the value of each vote in each constituency will be equal,” he said. He said around 133 people took part in the debate on the bill, of which 56 were women.
Amit Shah said, “No one has objected to reservation for women. But, if we look carefully, all the members of the India-India alliance have opposed it with the help of ‘ifs and buts’. Those opposing the delimitation are actually opposing the increase in seats for SC/ST. The Constitution Amendment Bill was later rejected in the Lok Sabha.
