Samajwadi Party MP Dimple Yadav on Friday accused the government of misrepresenting the Opposition’s stand on the women’s reservation law, highlighting that the parties had supported the bill's passage in 2023.
Speaking during the Lok Sabha debate, Yadav stated the party is not in favour of the constitutional amendment in its current form. The SP MP said the government lacked genuine commitment to women’s empowerment and that it had introduced the bill as its "vote share is slipping."
She questioned why the Census had not been conducted over the last two-and-a-half years, alleging that the government was showing "so much haste" and aimed only to "weaponise the delimitation" exercise.
"If the government truly wanted women’s empowerment, the Census would have been conducted by now and women would already have got their rights... You have brought this amendment because you see your vote share slipping," Yadav said and further demand equal representation for women from SC, ST, OBC and minorities communities.
Earlier, she also told the reporters that the BJP wants the Women's Reservation Bill to be implemented through a specific sequence, questioning the government's intentions.
"We understand what is important; we want women to come and sit in the House. However, just like the saying about 'elephant's tusks', one set for show and another for eating, the government appears to be acting in a similar fashion," Dimple said.
"While it shows one thing, in reality, it wants to use the pretext of delimitation and conduct it based on a 20-year-old census. Therefore, the government's intentions and motives are not clear at all," she added.
Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav accused the BJP of using the Women's Reservation Bill as a "pretext" to carry out delimitation and redraw Lok Sabha constituencies for electoral gain.
"It is difficult to understand the BJP. When people were told that there would be an SIR, they were doing NRC. Now, under the pretext of women's reservation, they want to create a Lok Sabha of their choice by doing delimitation so that they don't lose," Yadav told reporters outside the parliament.
He said the SP supports the reservation for women but questioned the linkage with delimitation. "We are in favour of women's reservation. Why do they want to create a constituency of their choice?" he asked.
