Congress Gambit: 40% Tickets to Women in UP Polls
STORIES, ANALYSES, EXPERT VIEWS
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s recent announcement that the party will give 40 per cent of its tickets to women in the upcoming UP elections is a welcome step if the message goes to the women who form almost half the electorate.
Having tried other tactics, the party strategists might have resorted to gender politics as a bold gambit, writes Kalyani Shankar (former Political Editor of the Hindustan Times and former Washington correspondent of the Hindustan Times). “After all, the gender issue cuts across all castes and communities. Most political parties have been using caste and religion to get votes from the electorate.”
The Rajya Sabha passed the Constitution (One Hundred and Eighth Amendment) Bill that sought to reserve one-third of all seats for women in Parliament and state legislatures. However, the Lok Sabha did not pass the bill. Most of the UP regional parties had opposed the quota bill or given halfhearted support when the bill came up in Parliament.
As per the 2019 Lok Sabha election data, Uttar Pradesh had 6.61 crore registered women voters as against 7.79 men, which makes women’s share in the electorate about 46 per cent. Uttar Pradesh has 403 assembly seats, and Congress has to find 160 women candidates in the next few weeks. In the 2017 UP Assembly polls, the number of women MLAs rose to forty compared to 36 in 2012.
The quota announcement, writes Shankar “comes on the back of a reasonable strike rate shown by women candidates in the recent panchayat polls in the U.P. They won 54 per cent of village ‘Gram Pradhan’ (village chiefs) seats. Over the last few years, many political parties have promoted almost 50 per cent quota for women in local body elections but have not extended this to assembly or parliamentary polls.”
Difficulties in implementation
There are difficulties in implementing the concept. “The first hurdle is finding more than 100 winnable candidates in the next few weeks in a state which is chauvinistic and caste-oriented. So far, only social engineering and broad alliance have helped political parties.
“Secondly, Congress plans to go solo in the polls, which may not be advantageous as the party has no organizational support while the other regional parties and the BJP have strong cadres. The Congress lost the support of its main base – Muslims and Dalits.
“Thirdly women are not homogenous groups, and they do not always support other women in polls, as has been seen so far.
“Fourthly, the other parties are now fielding dons and candidates with criminal backgrounds, as the statistics show. It will be tough for women candidates to fight unless they also have a political mentor or family background. It will be daunting for an ordinary woman to match muscle and money power……”
But “in spite of all odds if the gambit works in U.P it will go a long way in women’s empowerment…..”
Congress getting its act together
Despite the odds, according to Rasheed Kidwai (Senior journalist and author) the “Congress under the Gandhi trio — Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka — seems to be getting its act together. The outcome of the 2022 Assembly polls in Punjab, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Goa and Manipur is keenly awaited…..”
Priyanka’s “offer to grant 40 per cent tickets to women candidates is interesting and innovative. There is lack of empirical research on gender-based voting patterns, but in recent years, Mamata Banerjee, Narendra Modi and Arvind Kejriwal have been successful in mobilising a greater percentage of women voters. The big question is whether Priyanka Gandhi can show some spark of her grandmother Indira Gandhi……”
Rahul, on the other hand, says Kidwai “is focusing on issues of ideology. His move to induct Kanhaiya Kumar and Jignesh Mevani and the importance accorded to Hardik Patel are courageous as Rahul seems inclined to look beyond the Indian middle-class voters. The middle class may have been a great beneficiary of the Congress-led economic reforms, but currently, it is with the BJP. Rahul is keen to court and champion the cause of the poor, farmers, daily-wage earners and other marginalised sections of society. The left-of-centre tilt is there for everyone to see and those unwilling to buy his line of thinking are encouraged to head for the exit gates.
Poll arithmetic against Congress
“Long-time Congress watchers say the arithmetic is simple. There are over 200 Lok Sabha seats spread across Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Goa, parts of Maharashtra, Odisha, Jammu, Punjab etc., where the Congress is in a direct contest with the BJP. At present, the BJP holds sway in almost 90 per cent of such seats. Unless the Congress manages to deal a blow and reduce the BJP tally to 50-60 per cent, the chances of its revival are slim.
“Outside this cluster, the Congress is in a triangular or multi-cornered contest with the BJP on the one hand and non-NDA regional parties on the other. The alliance strategy has its limitations as bargaining for seats from a position of weakness is a non-starter in politics.” The important point is that “Rahul and Priyanka are far less reverential towards the regional satraps, including the chief ministers of the party-ruled states or chief-ministerial aspirants in the poll-bound states.”
