Congress asks Centre to bring women’s quota Bill in budget session

Telangana CM KCR’s daughter K Kavitha has launched a demonstration, demanding the introduction of the Women’s Reservation Bill in the upcoming budget session.

New Delhi | Updated: 10 March, 2023 9:21 pm IST

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh has called PM Modi a 'dictator PM'

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said the Bill has not lapsed yet and can be revived.

On a day when the Bharath Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader K Kavitha sat on a protest in Delhi demanding the Women’s Reservation Bill, the Congress on Friday asked the BJP to make its stand clear on the Bill.

The grand old party demanded that the Bill be tabled in the Lok Sabha in the upcoming second part of the budget session of parliament.

In a tweet, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said, “The landmark Women’s Reservation Bill was passed in the Rajya Sabha on 9th March 2010, ENTIRELY due to the efforts of the Congress leadership.”

“But it could not find support in Lok Sabha. The Bill has not lapsed. It is alive and pending. What has stopped it from being revived?” he asked.

His remarks came on a day when Kavitha, daughter of Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao observed a hunger strike seeking passage of the long-pending Bill in the budget session which starts March 13.

Congress leader Alka Lamba also said that the Bill could not be passed from parliament during the UPA rule even after getting cleared by the Rajya Sabha because the party did not have the majority in the lower house.

“We were successful in getting the Women’s Reservation Bill passed in the Rajya Sabha. It is alive and the BJP government has a majority in the Lok Sabha, they had promised 33 per cent reservation to women in their 2019 manifesto and even before that, but are still quiet on it even after nine years in government,” she told media persons at the party headquarters.

Lamba further said, “The parliament session is starting. The BJP government must make its stand clear and table the Women’s Reservation Bill in the Lok Sabha and ensure the rights of the women.”

The second leg of the budget session will end on April 6.

The Women’s Reservation Bill, which proposes a constitutional amendment to reserve one-third of the seats in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, was first introduced by the HD Deve Gowda government in 1996 but held up due to some objections. In another push during the UPA era, the Bill was passed by the Rajya Sabha in 2010.