New Delhi, March 13: The Congress, which pushed the Women’s Reservation Bill in the Rajya Sabha, has introduced quota for women in the Youth Congress, but not in the parent body. But even in the Youth Congress, the reservation is much less than 33 per cent.
In the Youth Congress, where organisational elections have begun, about 12 per cent seats are reserved for women presidents at the district level while in the working committees at all levels, at least one post is reserved for women.
Though women workers have been complaining over the issue, they are not very vocal. But taking note of the sentiment, the party has decided to have one man and one woman election coordinator in every district. This would encourage more women to participate in organisational elections, it argued.
“We may not be able to reserve seats for women in our organisational elections but will ensure that a good number of them contest elections. To encourage women to come forward and contest elections, we plan to have one woman coordinator for each district,” said J D Seelam, Additional State Returning Officer for Congress organisational elections in Uttar Pradesh.
How far this would help increase women representation remains to be seen, but at present, there is no gender parity in the Congress despite the fact that both the national and state presidents are women.
The party has only one woman among its 20 MLAs — Ameeta Singh from Amethi, who is the wife of Congress MP Sanjay Singh.
Of the 76 district and city units of the party, only two have woman presidents — Dr Shashilata Chauhan in Kanshiramnagar and Usha Dube in Kannuaj. In the Lok Sabha, the Congress has 23 members and among them only three are women — Sonia Gandhi, Annu Tandon from Unnao and Ratna Singh from Paratapgarh. Ratna Singh is the daughter of late Dinesh Singh, who was once the External Affairs Minister.
State Mahila Congress president Meera Singh said: “We have been demanding reservation for women in the party. We have been assured that there will be one woman coordinator in every district during elections. We believe that this time, when our committees are formed, there will be more women representation.”
Meanwhile, the schedule for organisational elections into the party’s parent body has been announced in the state and polling for primary committees will begin on April 10.
——Agencies