Women’s Quota Law: PM Urges Opposition Not To Give ‘Political Colour’

NEW DELHI : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday urged the opposition not to give a political colour to the government’s bills for implementation of the women’s reservation law and cautioned that they should be mindful that those who had opposed this in the past had suffered badly in elections.
Allaying fears on delimitation, he assured that no injustice will be done to any state – from east to west and north to south.
Intervening in the debate in Lok Sabha on the three bills moved to amend the women’s quota law and set up a delimitation commission, Modi said if all sides support the bills, it will not go in favour of politics of any one side but would be in favour of the country.
“Since women’s reservation came into discussion, those who opposed this in the past, were not forgiven by the women of the country and they ended up badly in the elections that followed,” Modi said.
The Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill to tweak the women’s quota law was introduced in Lok Sabha on Thursday after a division of votes.
Two ordinary bills — the Delimitation Bill and the Union Territories Laws (Amendment) Bill to implement the proposed amended women’s quota law in Union territories of Delhi, Puducherry and Jammu and Kashmir — were also introduced in the House.
In his remarks, Modi said there is no need to give political colour to the issue of women reservation in legislatures.
“Let us all MPs not miss this important opportunity to give reservation to women,” the prime minister said.
In India’s development journey, MPs have got an opportunity to make women part of decision making, he said.
“I have come to appeal to you that do not see this from a political lens, this is a decision in national interest,” Modi said.
Earlier, the Bills were introduced after a fiery 40-minute debate following which the opposition pressed for the division of votes to introduce the Constitutional (131st Amendment) Bill.
The Bill was later introduced with 251 members supporting it and 185 members voting against the introduction. (AGENCIES)