CHANDIGARH: Terming it a “grave sin” by the opposition, Delhi BJP minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa on Monday lashed out at opposition parties over the women’s quota bill failing to secure a two-thirds majority in the Lok Sabha.
Speaking to the media in Amritsar, Sirsa said opposition parties, including the Indian National Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party, opposed the bill because they did not want the BJP to get credit for implementing women’s reservation.
“If women got reservations in the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabhas, then people would have asked the Congress and its allies why they did not do it in the last 70 years,” he said.
Sirsa said the opposition had “betrayed daughters and sisters” by voting against the bill and warned that they would face public anger.
He also claimed that Punjab would have benefited if the bill had been passed, saying the state’s share of Lok Sabha seats would have risen from 13 to 20, while the number of Assembly seats would have increased from 117 to more than 170.
Reiterating the message of Prime Minister Modi, Sirsa said the fight to ensure women get their rights would continue.
While 298 members voted in support of the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill, 230 MPs voted against it on April 17.
Out of the 528 members who voted, the bill required 352 votes for a two-thirds majority.
The bill proposed increasing the number of Lok Sabha seats to 816 from the current 543 to operationalise the women’s reservation law before the 2029 parliamentary polls, following a delimitation exercise based on the 2011 Census.
Seats were also to be increased in assemblies of states and Union territories to accommodate 33 per cent reservation for women.
