00:00 At the very onset, let us remind ourselves that this is India, a country where the poet
00:06 K.B.
00:07 Azmi in 1940, 81 years ago, 82 years ago, before independence, wrote in his poem, "Aurat,"
00:13 "Ut meri jaan, mere saath hi chalna hai tujhe.
00:17 Jarnat ek aur hai, jo mard ke pahloo mein nahin.
00:22 Uski aazad ravish par bhi macharna hai tujhe.
00:25 Ban ke tufan, chalakna hai, ubarna hai tujhe.
00:29 Ut meri jaan, mere saath hi chalna hai tujhe."
00:32 This is in India, where Tagore in 1928 wrote in his poem, "Shobola," "Nari ke aapon
00:37 bhaggo joi kori baar, kaino nahin dibe udhikar, he bhi dhata?"
00:41 "O Lord, why will you not give women the right to determine their own destiny?"
00:46 This is in India, where in 1946, when the Constituent Assembly was elected, 15 seats
00:52 went to women who had to draft the Constitution.
00:54 Both the United States and the United Kingdom saw lengthy suffragette movements before women
00:59 were granted the right to vote.
01:01 India's founders in 1947, Apron, agreed to the principle of universal adult suffrage,
01:06 giving simultaneously the right to vote to women and to men.
01:10 There was never any question of denying women the right to vote while giving it to men.
01:15 All 15 members of the Constituent Assembly who were women rejected the demand for any
01:21 special women's reservation on July 18, 1947.
01:26 Member activist Renuka Roy noted that "Vijayalakshmi Pandit has not been selected because she is
01:30 a woman, nor was sex made a bar to the appointment.
01:34 It is her proven worth that has been responsible for her appointment to the high office of
01:38 ambassador to our land."
01:40 The demand for special reservation is an insult to our intelligence and to our capacity.
01:46 So sure were our founding mothers that this great land would not deny her women their
01:51 rightful place based on merit.
01:53 But alas, it is 75 years later.
01:57 And today it is both my pride and my shame that I stand here as a woman in India's parliament
02:02 speaking on a women's reservation bill.
02:05 It is my pride that I belong to the All India Trinamool Congress, a party that sends 37%
02:11 women among its members to parliament.
02:14 It is my chagrin that I belong to a Lok Sabha, a house of the people, that on aggregate has
02:19 only 15% of its members as women, far below the global average of 26.5% and also below
02:27 the Asian regional average of 21%.
02:30 As this government caps itself on its back for its rankings on various global tables,
02:34 let it also hang its head in disgrace that this same India ranks 140 out of 196 countries
02:41 in the inter-parliamentary union league tables on women's representation.
02:45 Within women parliamentarians, Muslims and Dalits have been consistently underrepresented.
02:52 From 1952 to 2004, only eight Muslim women were elected to India's parliament, to the
02:58 Lok Sabha, many of whom served multiple terms.
03:02 In today's Lok Sabha, the 17th Lok Sabha, there are only two Muslim women members, both
03:07 from West Bengal, both from the All India Trinamool Congress.
03:12 The numbers for male and female turnout in the last general election were nearly the
03:15 same, 66.7% and 66.8% respectively.
03:21 But women's candidature, that number of women who are being put up for elections, which
03:25 is the first step towards getting elected to the Lok Sabha, remained at an abysmal 9%,
03:31 up from only 7% in 2004.
03:35 As we started our innings yesterday, our new innings, in this newly constructed temple
03:41 of democracy, our Honourable Prime Minister grandly proclaimed that it seemed he was ordained
03:48 to perform many important tasks for this country, including this one.
03:52 And then with much fanfare, this government introduced this bill, claiming credit as usual
03:57 for a groundbreaking move.
04:00 But wait, what does this bill really say?
04:03 Article 334 of the bill says, "The reservation shall come into effect only after delimitation
04:09 has been undertaken.
04:10 Delimitation will only be undertaken after the relevant figures for the next census have
04:15 been published.
04:16 The rotation of seats for women shall take effect after each subsequent exercise of delimitation."
04:22 So what does this mean?
04:24 In true BJP's Gebelzian double-speak style, it means we don't know if and actually when
04:31 we will actually have 33% of women sitting in the Lok Sabha.
04:36 Because number one, the date of the next census is entirely indeterminate.
04:42 Because of this, number two, the date of the next delimitation exercise is therefore doubly
04:47 indeterminate.
04:48 It is also controversial, as my esteemed colleague, Kanimoji from the DMK spoke.
04:55 She said, according to the data, we will have an increase of 0% in the number of seats for
05:00 Kerala, 26% for Tabernadoo, but a whopping 79% increase for both Madhya Pradesh and Uttar
05:08 Pradesh.
05:09 So women's reservation is dependent on two totally indeterminate dates.
05:13 Can there be a greater jumla?
05:15 Forget 2024.
05:16 This may not even be possible in 2029.
05:20 We are being asked time and again, do we support the women's reservation bill?
05:24 Trinamool Congress is bill ko support karega ya nahi?
05:27 BJP's Liaison members are reaching out to us, asking us to support this bill wholeheartedly.
05:32 No ifs, no buts, pura support, please kijiye.
05:35 To them we say very clearly, we not only support a women's reservation bill, but in truth,
05:41 it is Mamata Banerjee, India's only female Chief Minister today, who is the mother of
05:46 this bill, who has given birth to the original idea where she has unconditionally sent 37%
05:53 of women MPs to this parliament on her ticket.
05:57 What you have brought here, what this government has brought here today, is not a women's reservation
06:02 bill.
06:03 It is a women's reservation rescheduling bill and should be renamed as such.
06:09 Its agenda is delay.
06:10 Its agenda is not reservation.
06:13 The endless dithering over when there will be the next census, when there will be the
06:17 next delimitation, will only ensure that the urgent need of reservation for women in elections
06:22 to the parliament and to state legislatures will be indefinitely delayed yet again.
06:28 Alas, this is not the historic bill that it is being touted as.
06:32 It is a sham.
06:34 And for the women and the men and the girls and the boys who will be the future women
06:37 and men of India, we had better recognize this, because it is staring at us in the face.
06:44 And I also hope that a sufficient number amongst us, the current members of parliament, also
06:48 recognize this bill for what it is, which is a sham.
06:51 The question of women's reservation requires action, not the placebo of legislatively mandated
06:57 procrastination.
06:58 To the government and the ruling party, I say this, give us this day our equal rights.
07:05 We hold up half the sky.
07:07 Give us at least a third of our earth.
07:10 Mamata Banerjee and the Trinamool Congress have already walked the talk.
07:15 We don't need to go on record to show this country that we support this bill.
07:20 We have already sent more MPs than what this bill even envisions.
07:24 It is you, this government, this ruling dispensation that needs to go on record.
07:29 You need to support us, not the other way around.
07:32 You need to send more than 33% MPs to this parliament.
07:36 When this government wanted to protect cows, and I support the move, make no mistake, you
07:41 did not wait to count the number of cows.
07:43 You did not wait to see whether the cow was a Jersey or a Gir or a Sahiwal.
07:48 You just went and built the cow shelters.
07:50 Are we women any less that we have to wait while you count numbers and you draw lines?
07:57 We don't need any more Vandans.
07:58 We don't need any more Vandanas.
07:59 Thank you very much.
08:01 What we need is direct action.
08:03 Honourable Prime Minister, this is your moment to really show us all that Modi is possible.
08:09 Implement the reservation bill immediately based on today's voters list.
08:15 Send 33% women to parliament.
08:18 Send 33% women to parliament in 2024 from the BJP the way our party has done.
08:26 Support us unreservedly.
08:28 In conclusion, I can only echo the poet Priyana Ruhi's words.
08:33 Dil ke bhelane ka samaan na samjha jaaye, humko ab itna bhi aasaan na samjha jaaye.
08:41 Hum bhi logon ki tarah jeene ka haq maangte hai, isko bhagavat ka ailaan na samjha jaaye.
08:46 Thank you very much.
08:47 Subscribe to One India channel and never miss an update.
08:51 (bell chimes)
Comments