Nita Bhalla Thomson Reuters Foundation The pitiful show of female candidates in India's state elections is an indictment of the failure of successive governments to enact a two-decade-old bill to give women a stronger voice in parliament, activists said. In the world's largest democracy, women hold only 12 percent of seats in the lower and upper houses of parliament combined, says the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) - just over half the global average of 23%. After years of lobbying by activists, a bill - which provides for one-third of the seats in national and state assemblies to be reserved for women - was passed by the upper house in 2010. Yet it has faced vehement resistance from male lawmakers and has failed to be tabled for discussion in the lower house, despite pledges by successive governments over the last seven years to enact the legislation. The National Alliance for the Women's Reservation Bill, a coalition of over 20 women's rights organisations, said their research showed in polls currently taking place across five Indian states, women made up less than 6% of candidates. "Women face so many difficulties in India and it is the same in political parties. Just enter these male-dominated, patriarchal political party offices and you will realise how difficult it is to survive as a woman in politics in India," said Ranjana Kumari, director of the Centre for Social Research. The state polls - taking place in Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand in the north, Goa in the southwest and Manipur in the northeast - show abysmally low numbers of women being fielded by all parties, including Prime Minister Narendra's Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), said the alliance. India is ranked 87 out of 144 countries in the Global Gender Gap 2016, an annual report by the World Economic Forum which measures how women fare in areas such as economic participation, health, education and political representation. The IPU ranks India's representation of women in national parliament well below neighbouring states such as Pakistan, which has 21 percent female representation, Afghanistan with 28 percent, Nepal with 30 percent, and Bangladesh with 20 percent.
