Women’s reservation: How India stacks up against the world, in charts
The long-pending bill to reserve seats for women in India’s national and state legislatures could give a much-needed boost to women’s role in the country’s electoral politics. Women’s representation in the Lok Sabha has increased gradually over the years, but India hasn’t quite kept pace with the progress in the rest of the world, a Mint analysis of data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) showed. A total of 82 members of the lower house, or 15.2%, are women at present.
While the number is dismal, it is a significant increase from just 4.4% in the first Lok Sabha that sat between 1952 and 1957. The figure entered double digits for the first time only in the 15th Lok Sabha (2009-2014). However, despite this progress, India is among the bottom 25% countries on this metric, down from being in the bottom 40% in 1997, a historical analysis showed.
Percentiles, and not rankings, were used for historical comparison since the number of countries in IPU’s coverage was different each year. India’s current standing on this metric puts it at the 141st rank among 185 countries for which IPU gave data as of 1 September 2023. The rank pertains to only the lower chamber in countries with unicameral legislatures.
IPU is an international organization of national Parliaments. The overall share of women in Parliaments of its member nations is 26.7%. The Centre was on Tuesday expected to table the Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-eighth Amendment) Bill, 2023, in the Lok Sabha during a special Parliament session that began on Monday.
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