By TwoCircles.net news desk,
Muslim organizations welcomed the resolve shown by the UPA government for the introduction of 33% reservation for women in Parliament and legislative houses but they demanded separate quota for SC, ST and backward classes, particularly Muslim women.
Ms.Parveen Abdi, founder Secretary General of All India Muslim Women’s Personal Law Board, appreciated the UPA chairperson and all those who have supported the move for the introduction of women’s reservation bill and termed the move as a historic leap in women empowerment.
She asked the government to ensure that the reservation is not hijacked by the upper caste women. For that she demanded to provide separate seats within the proposed 33% to the SC, ST, backward classes and minorities including Muslim women.
“Muslim women need special attention because they suffer doubly for being women and Muslim, whose representation in elected bodies is on an ever increasing decline. The present Lok Sabha has the all time lowest number of Muslim MPs. If the trend continues Muslim society as a whole may require reservation in the Parliament and state legislatures. Therefore, it is imperative for every political party and people entrusted with obligation to ensure fair and proper functioning of the constitutional institutions, to ensure that every community gets its due representation in parliament and state legislatures. Thus, in order to make women’s reservation a meaningful attempt, the rights of SC,ST, Backward classes and Muslim women should not be ignored,” said Ms. Parveen Abdi.
The Joint Committee of Muslim Organizations for Empowerment (JCMOE) also repeated the same demand.
“Ever since the 90’s when the proposal of 1/3 reservation for women was mooted, the Muslim community has demanded a separate quota of 4% for Muslim women primarily on two grounds.
Firstly, Muslim women are not politically advanced to get elected to the legislatures, as the experience of 60 years has shown. Secondly, Muslims have been persistently under-represented in the Parliament and the state legislatures” said Syed Shahabuddin, the Convener of JCMOE.
Expressing his concern on the present form of the Women’s Bill he said: “An extension of the reserved space will reduce seats available for election of Muslims, who already face many obstacles. In 2009, only 30 Muslims have been elected to the L.S. which means a deprivation of above 60%. Their deprivation is likely to rise to 75%.”
Referring to the Sachar Committee report, he said that if the proposed bill is passed, Muslim women would not get advantage rather they would face much deprivation.
“Sachar Committee has found that Muslims constitute a backward class, almost as backward as SC/ST and more backward than non-Muslim OBC’s” he said.
“In any case, the proposed reservation for women will include high castes, which like OBC’s and Muslims do not enjoy reservation in legislatures. So Muslims have also been proposing that the reservation for women in the legislature should subsume proportionate part of the existing SC/ ST quotas as well as provide proportional sub-quotas for the women of the deprived groups like Muslims and non-Muslim OBC’s, rather than open the whole quota for high castes” he added.
However, the Muslim community appreciates the stand in this matter taken by some secular parties like SP, RJD and LJP as well as by the JD (U)’.