PROJECT ON

WOMEN IN INDIAN POLITICS

SUBMITTED TO

Dr.Subba Rao

(Associate professor in Political science)

By

S. Shiny Sree

I year B.Com.LL.B (Hons)

(Reg no.BC0150023)

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 ACKNOWNLEDGMENT
At the outset, I take this opportunity to thank my Professor Dr.Subba Rao from
the bottom of my heart who has been of immense help during moments of
anxiety and torpidity while the project was taking its crucial shape.

Secondly, I convey my deepest regards to the Vice Chancellor Arun Roy and
the administrative staff of TNNLS who held the project in high esteem by
providing reliable information in the form of library infrastructure and database
connections in times of need.

Thirdly, the contribution made by my parents and friends by foregoing their

Finally, I thank the Almighty who gave me the courage and stamina to
confront all hurdles during the making of this project. Words aren’t sufficient to
acknowledge the tremendous contributions of various people involved in this
project, as I know ‘Words are Poor Comforters’. I once again wholeheartedly and
earnestly thank all the people who were involved directly or indirectly during this
project making which helped me to come out with flying colours.

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 DECLARATION

I, S. Shiny Sree do hereby declare that the project entitled “WOMEN POLITICS IN

INDIA ” submitted to Tamil Nadu National law school in partial fulfillment of requirement of

award of degree in undergraduate in law is a record of original work done by me under the

supervision and guidance of Professor Dr.Subba Rao, department of Political Science, Tamil

Nadu National law school and has not formed basis for award of any degree or diploma or

fellowship or any other title to any other candidate of any university.

S. Shiny Sree

B.Com., LL.B (Hons)

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 Research Methodology

The research methodology used in this project is analytical and descriptive. Data has been

collected from various books, materials, papers and web sources. This project is based upon non-

doctrinal method of research. This project has been done after a thorough research based upon

intrinsic and extrinsic aspects of the project.

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 CONTENTS

 INTRODUCTION

 HISTORY OF WOMEN

 WOMEN IN PRE INDEPENDENCE ERA

 WOMEN IN POST INDEPENDENCE ERA

 POLITICAL CONTRIBUTION OF WOMEN

 GENDER EQUALITY

 MEASURES TAKEN FOR EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN

 TOP WOMEN POLITICIANS

 CHALLENGES FOR WOMEN IN POLITICS

 NEW MEDIA FOR EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN

 OBSTACLES THAT KEEP WOMEN AWAY FROM POLITICS

 CONCLUSION

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 INTRODUCTION
India is a country which promotes the legal rights of women. Women are given equal importance

as of men. Despite the initial hurdles of women’s participation in politics, such as managing the

family, the issues of ‘feminity’ etc., Indian women are quite active in the political arena and

their participation today remains stronger than ever.

Indian women can vote and stand for election to all provincial and central bodies. Women have

been ministers, ambassadors and, most notably, the Prime Minister. Women vote in

approximately the same proportion as men. Most women follow the lead of male family

members, but a few surveys suggest that women are increasingly interested in political power

and vote independently. The number of women elected to the assemblies often seems larger than

it is because of the personalities involved.

India’s record of women politics was impressive but not remarkable on the historical perspective.

The politics of agitation brought women into all aspects of the freedom movement where they

demonstrated their bravery. Following Independence women found it difficult to make the

transition from the politics of agitation to electoral politics. While the extent of their involvement

falls far short of the equality promised by the CONSTITUTION OF INDIA, it is significant in

comparison with other countries of the world.

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 HISTORY OF WOMEN
The history of women in India has been eventful. Women have held high offices including that

of the President ,Prime Minister , Speaker of the Lok Sabha ,Leader of the Opposition , Union

Ministers ,Chief Ministers and Governors.

Women during the early Vedic period enjoyed equal status with men in all aspects of life. Works

by ancient Indian grammarians such as Patanjali and Katyayana suggest that women were

educated in the early Vedic period. Rigvedic verses show that women married at a mature age

and were probably free to select their own husbands.

During 5000 B.C. ., the status of women began to decline. Reform movements such as Jainism

allowed women to be admitted to religious orders. Large women in India faced confinement and

restrictions. The practice of child marriages is believed to have started around the sixth century.

Women often became prominent in the fields of politics, literature, education and religion. Razia

Sultana became the only woman monarch to have ever ruled Delhi. The Gond queen Durgavati

ruled for fifteen years before losing her life in a battle with Mughal emperor Akbar's general

Asaf Khan in 1564. Chand Bibi defended Ahmednagar against the powerful Mughal forces of

Akbar in the 1590s. Jahangir’s wife Nur Jehan effectively wielded imperial power, and was

recognized as the real power behind the Mughal throne. The Mughal princesses Jahanara and

Zebunnissa were well-known poets, and also influenced the ruling powers. Shivaji s mother,

Jijabai , was queen regent because of her ability as a warrior and an administrator. In South

India, many women administered villages, towns, and divisions, and ushered in new social and

religious institutions.

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 WOMEN DURING PRE INDEPENDENCE ERA

Guru Nanak, the first Guru of Sikhs, preached equality between men and women. He advocated

that women be allowed to lead religious assemblies; to lead congregational hymn singing called

Kirtan or Bhajan , to become members of religious management committees, to lead armies on

the battlefield, to have equality in marriage, and to have equality in Amrit (Baptism).

European scholars observed in the 18th century that Hindu women are "naturally chaste" and

"more virtuous" than other women. There was no positive British contribution during the Raj era.

Missionaries' wives such as Martha Mault née Mead and her daughter Eliza Caldwell née

Mault are rightly remembered for pioneering the education and training of girls in south India.

This practice was initially had local resistance, as it was against tradition.

Rani Lakshmi Bai, the Queen of Jhansi, led the Indian Rebellion of 1857 against the British.

She is now widely considered as a national hero. Begum Hazrat Mahal, the co-ruler of Awadh,

was another ruler who led the revolt of 1857. She refused deals with the British and later

retreated to Nepal. The Begums of Bhopal were also considered notable female rulers during

this period. They did not observe purdah and were trained in martial arts.

Women during the pre independence era focused only on freedom struggles. They were well

trained in warfare for the administration in war matters. It also means that women were only

used for the marriage and children, but great efforts by great pioneers resulted in women

upliftment during the pre independence as well as the Gandhian era.

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 WOMEN DURING THE POST INDEPENDENCE ERA

After independence women in India started participating in sports, education, media , art and

culture , service sectors and political affairs. Indira Gandhi , who served as Prime Minister of

India for an aggregate period of fifteen years, is the world's longest serving woman Prime

Minister. The Constitution of India guarantees to:

 All Indian women equality (Article 14),

 No discrimination by the State (Article 15(1)),

 Equality of opportunity (Article 16),

 Equal pay for equal work (Article 39(d)).

Feminist activism in India gained momentum in the late 1970s. One of the first national-level

issues that brought women's groups together was the Mathura rape case. The protest due to the

case widely covered by the national media, forced the Government to amend the Evidence Act,

the Criminal Procedure Code, and the Indian Penal Code; and created a new offence,

custodial rape.

The Government of India declared 2001 as the Year of Women's Empowerment. The National

Policy for the Empowerment of Women came was passed in 2001 India is considered as the

"fourth most dangerous country" in the world for women. India was also noted as the worst

country for women among the G20 countries. However, this report has faced criticism for its

inaccuracy. On 9 March 2010, one day after International Women's day, Rajya Sabha passed the

Women's Reservation Bill requiring that 33% of seats in India's Parliament and state legislative

bodies be reserved for women.

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 POLITICAL CONTRIBUTION OF WOMEN

India has one of the highest number of female politicians in the world. Women have held high

offices in India including that of the President, Prime Minister, Speaker of the Lok Sabha and

Leader of the Opposition. The Indian states Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttarakhand, Himachal

Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Orissa,

Rajasthan and Tripura have implemented 50% reservation for women in PRIs. Majority of

candidates in these Panchayaths are women. Currently 100% of elected members in Kodassery

Panchayat in Kerala are Women.

EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN IN POLITICS

Promoting women’s participation in politics is one of the core areas of women empowerment.

Active participation of women in the mainstream political activities, political processes,

decision-making and policy formulation certainly has a strong bearing on the governance

structure, nation-building and development of a country. The presence of women in the decision-

making levels not only enhances their social, political and economic status, but also strengthens

democratic institutions by making them more inclusive and meaningful. political participation is

not only about the right to vote, but also about power-sharing, decision-making and policy

formulation at all levels of governance. Democracy at the grassroots level provides an

opportunity to women to participate and flourish within a small unit, realize a sense of

democratic responsibility and get instilled with the values of democracy and good governance.

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 GENDER EQUALITY

In India, the principle of gender equality is enshrined in the Constitution. Our Constitution

guarantees to all women the fundamental right to equality under which they get equal voting

rights and equal right to political participation. Our Constitution is firmly grounded in the

principles of liberty, fraternity, equality and justice, and accordingly contains a number of

provisions for the empowerment of women. The political rights of women in India are thus

recognized without any discrimination or distinction and, as such, they have the right to

participate in decision-making process at all levels equally with men.

India, in fact, was a pioneer in extending adult franchise to its women population in the very first

General Elections held after Independence. The right to constitutional equality has been

supplemented by legal equality with the enactment of a number of legislations through which the

traditional inequalities in respect of marriage, divorce and property rights are sought to be

eliminated.

However, there is still a need for an increased representation of women in the political and

legislative bodies so as to enable them to have a more effective role and say in decision-making

processes. Though the evolution of Indian democracy through the 15 General Elections held so

far reflects an overall improvement in the working of our polity and governance structure, there

is still a low representation of women in Parliament, State Legislatures, political parties and

various decision-making bodies.

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 MEASURES TAKEN FOR EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN

Recognizing the need for making the position of women better and stronger, several measures

have been taken by our successive Governments in recent years to empower women socially,

economically and politically. Political empowerment of women has now been attached utmost

priority and their participation in other spheres such as governmental bodies, public

administration, Judiciary and corporate and technical bodies has been recognized as equally

important. As the pioneer of championing the cause of the women, our Parliament enacted the

National Commission for Women Act, 1990 paving way for the establishment of the National

Commission for Women in 1992 to safeguard the interests of women in our society. Our Joint

Parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women is yet another parliamentary initiative

aimed at monitoring, examining and reporting on the varied aspects of gender-related issues.

To further advance and empower women in India, the country has also adopted a National

Policy for Empowerment of Women in 2001 not only to eliminate all forms of discrimination

against women, but also to ensure that women in our society are encouraged and promoted to

actively participate in all spheres of life and activities. These apart, we also have gender-

budgeting in our country to mainstream gender concerns in public expenditure and policy-

making. In recent years, allocations for women related programmes and schemes in the budget

have been increased substantially.

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 TOP INDIAN WOMEN POLITICIANS

SONIA GANDHI:

 She is the live example of INDIRA GANDHI after her demise.

 It is by her sheer hard work and dedication that she has not only learnt the Hindi language

but manages the Congress party to perfection that today she is the epitome of Indian

Politics.

 She is now an inspiration for millions of Indian women.

MAMTA BANNERJEE:

 She has proved that patience pays ultimately.

 She has managed to break the jinx of Communist Party in Bengal who has ruled there for more

than half the century.

 She is the Railway minister of India and is working hard to improve the image of Indian railway.

J JAYALALITHA:

 She is the second women Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu.

 She has been the cult figure who has ruined the hopes of scam hit DMK and Congress

combined by winning the Tamil Nadu polls sweeping majority.

 From jail to Assembly hall , her journey has been marked with many ups and downs .

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MAYAWATI:

 She is the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh

 Being president of the Bahujan Samaj Party she is the most influential name in the Indian Politics

 She has worked hard to create a cult for herself.

SUSHMA SWARAJ:

 One of the most prominent female politician, she was the first women Chief Minister of

Delhi.

 She is the current Minister of External Affairs in India .

 She has been elected seven times as a Member of Parliament and three times as Member

of Legislative Assembly.

SHEILA DIKSHIT:

 She is the Chief Minister of Delhi since 1998

 She is close confidant of congress party chief Sonia Gandhi and has led the party to

victory for three consecutive terms.

 She had also represented Kannauj Lok Sabha seat in parliament.

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WOMEN UNION MINISTERS:
Smt. Ambika Soni - Minister of Information and Broadcasting

Kumari. Selja - Holding two departments namely Minister of Housing and Urban Poverty

Alleviation and Minister of Tourism

Smt. Krishna Tirath - Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Women and

Child Development

Smt. D.Purandeswari - Minister of State in the Ministry of Human Resource Development

Smt. Panabaka Lakshmi - Minister of State in the Ministry of Textiles

FORMER PRESIDENT AND SPEAKER:

Smt. Pratibha Devisingh Patil is the first women President of India and is actively working for

the upliftment of Indian women. The year 2009 witnessed the History written moments when

Smt. Mira Kumar became the first Indian women to hold the office of the Lok Sabha Speaker.

She is an ex-IFS officer and hails from the Bhojpuri land clearly indicating the women power in

politics.

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 INFLUENCE OF POLITICAL POWER:

The power of politics has influenced women from various fields. Many successful actresses of

Hindi film industry have attracted towards political arena and are now members of Parliament.

Hemamalini, Jaya Bachchan, Jayaprada are well known faces of the Indian Parliament.

Politics is now attracting women from all shares and they are actively participating in it.

YOUTH POWER:

The youth has seen it as a career option and the trends are changing day by day. Many young

politicians have evolved and have won by huge margins. Smt. Kiran Chaudhary, Ms. Agatha

Sangma, Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Supriya Sule and Priya Dutt, are the upcoming faces of the

Indian politics. Indirect involvement of women in politics is also increasing pace. Faces like

Priyanka Gandhi become visible only during election times and leave a deep impression on

voters.

PANCHAYATS AND STUDENT POLITICS:

Indian Panchayat system has the reservations for women and it has become a great platform for

the welfare of women and making the poor and village women's to come forward and share their

views for the betterment of Indian villages. Mass involvement of female workers in college and

university elections is also proving a boon for the large political structure.

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 CURRENT STATUS OF WOMENS POLITICAL

PARTICIPATION

There is considerable increase in the percentage of women as voters. The participation of women

as voters is almost equal to men. But the political participation (as a whole) of the women is not

equal to men and so they are still not able to get a share equivalent to men in organization that

require decision making. Still politics is dominated by men at every level of participation and

women have not been regarded as significant part of the political arena. The representation of

women as policy formulators and decision makers in the legislative bodies is very low. In

legislative bodies women have been demanding more space but most nations in the world have

failed in providing due space as well as representation to women in their political system. Thus,

from local level to global level, leadership and participation of the women in the political fields

are always compromised. Women are always underrepresented in leading positions, whether in

civil services, academia, elected offices or private sector. Such kind of situation prevails despite

their abilities and capabilities which has been proved as leaders and their right of participating at

par with men in democratic governance.

The women’s participation in the political fronts, gender roles have become major obstacles.

Besides, the traditional division of labor; economic barriers; the type of electoral system, lack of

sufficient training and rampant violence against women in Indian society in the form of dowry

deaths, sexual assaults, honour killings, acid attacks, domestic violence etc. are also some of the

contributories to keep women away from every sphere of public life including politics. Apart

from this, the process of elections has become a very costly affair. Women are not capable of

generating large amount of money required for fighting elections. Most of them fail to take off

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due to improper planning at the grass root level. This distressing state of affairs is also an

outcome of the continuous failure of women’s welfare policies. Corruption and centralization of

powers are the basic major obstacles for political participation of women in India because

Corruption and nepotism threaten to eat into the little good that has been done for women’s

empowerment in this country.

CHALLENGES FACED BY WOMEN IN POLITICS

Despite the improving participation of women in Indian Politics, there are some bigger

challenges which still need to be worked upon. The pity state of women still lays unnoticed in

many areas and it has been often seen that the male candidates uses them as mere puppets and

the reservations in Panchayats are sometimes become camouflage and the women remain just the

face and power is enjoyed by their counterparts.

The number of seats in current parliament is just 10%, this has to be increased to a significant

level. It has been often seen that the women with some glamorous background are given

backdoor entries whereas a large number of women spend their lives struggling to get to the

deserving seat.

Lastly, it can be said that the image and involvement of women in Indian Politics has increased

by many folds and some of them have successfully reached the top posts but a lot more has to be

done in order to increase their presence, works towards the betterment of the women society and

taking India parallel to the world's developed countries.

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NEW MEDIA FOR THE EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN INTO POLITICS

 New media encourage more women to enter formal politics: by building their

confidence as public a

 New media may empower women and girls by creating the opportunity to develop

public selves and exercise their abilities to argue and persuade;

 New media may undermine dominant media narratives: by creating innovative ways

of challenging them;

 New media may allow women politicians to bypass mainstream media by appealing

directly and proactively with voters, including women voters with the potential to

become more visible and, therefore more powerful;

 New media may spark women's interest for political thinking and action by

highlighting and educating women about issues that are of concern to them and by

encouraging women to network and act together;

 New media may strengthen women’s associations and political acts by spreading

awareness and enlarging movements.

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 OBSTACLES THAT KEEP WOMEN AWAY FROM POLITICS

The prevalence of the ‘masculine Political life is organised by male norms, values and

model’ of political life and of elected lifestyles and working patters

government bodies;

Lack of party support for women Women are rarely decision makers in political parties,

even though they play important roles in campaigning.

Lack of sustained contact and Although women’s organisations can help women

cooperation with public parliamentarians overcome barriers, there is a less

organizations such as trade (labour) contact between politicians and these groups,

unions and women’s groups Compared to other interest groups.

the nature of the electoral system, Different systems produce different numbers of

female parliamentarians. The PR system is most

conducive to high numbers of women elected

politicians.

Socio-economic obstacles Low socio economic status of women, compared to

men means women have fewer power and material

resources to support her move into politics

Linked to socio-economic obstacles: Women carry a disproportionate share of domestic

women’s lack of time resources work, despite high numbers of women in paid

employment. Women’s additional work burden

prevents them from having time necessary to engage

in politics

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Women’s socialisation male values tend to dominate politics in many

countries and women’s roles are culturally viewed as

being in the home rather than in politics. This impacts

on women’s confidence to engage in politics,

attitudinal prejudice against women and women’s lack

of trust and confidence in politics.

The role of the mass media, linked to Women politicians are covered less by the mass media

above than their male counterparts and events and issues of

importance to women are not covered as much as

other issues. This reduces women’s interest in politics.

Mass media also reinforces gender cultural

stereotypes about the role of women which prevent

women from engaging in politics.

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 CONCLUSION

Socioeconomic condition of women will improve only if they are also a part of the governing

process is a fact that is widely accepted the world over. It is often that “When you educate a

man , you educate a man , but when you educate a women , you educate a generation” .

Therefore it remains as every citizens vital duty to educate girls. Nothing can stand in the path of

educating a women when she has the needed support and will power. Also when it comes to

power it is important to remember women are also equal to men in all aspects. Building a good

nation does not depend on gender basis; it depends on a person’s courage to work hard. It is

obvious to believe that “Women can make better nations than men”

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 WORKS CITED

http://www.civilserviceindia.com/subject/Essay/women-in-indian-politics2.html

http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/society/changing-status-of-women-after-the-independence-of-

india/4398/

http://wonderwoman.intoday.in/photo/indias-powerful-woman-politician/1/3246.html#photo6

http://www.indianetzone.com/50/women_post_independent_india.html

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