Union minister Kiren Rijiju says bill defeat is not govt failure but a loss for women (ANI)
The minister went on to say that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while chairing the Union Cabinet meeting, also pointed out that the Opposition, particularly the Congress, will have to face the consequences of denying women their rights.
A day after the central government’s bid to push a Constitution amendment bill to expand the size of the Lok Sabha and fast-track 33% reservation for women failed, the minister doubled down on blaming the Opposition.
“The bills not getting passed is not a failure of our government, or our party. We are sad because it is a loss for women who have been denied participation in decision-making. But the opposition will have to face the consequences as well,” he said.
The minister said the Congress in particular will have to face women who are aggrieved and angry by the development. “They are celebrating women’s defeat, which is proof of their anti-women mindset,” he told media persons.
The Congress, for its part, has accused the government of conspiring to alter the federal structure of the country by introducing the delimitation bill. The government, however, asserted that its proposal to increase the seats by 50% would have ensured that the proportional representation of the states remained intact.
Rijiju slammed the Congress for suggesting that the government declined to discuss the issue with its opponents and said he reached out to leaders of all the major parties to seek their support for the proposed bills.
“I spoke to the Congress several times. They wrote letters (Kharge had urged the government to hold an all party meeting) but did not attend any meeting. They refuse to come and then claim there was no discussion…” he said.
The minister also explained that he chose to meet the leaders individually as he wanted to address their concerns.
“How we should approach different parties will be decided by us. How can they dictate that we should follow a certain path of consultation? We met individually so we could discuss in detail the nitty gritty…We wanted to negotiate and the meetings (with other parties) were fruitful,” he said.
He said the Congress had been dialling other parties to not attend the meetings called by the government to discuss the issue.
Responding to the allegation that the government had its eye on delimitation rather than the implementation of quotas for women, the minister said, “The home minister explained in detail how the number of seats had been frozen and we needed an amendment…The country’s population has increased three times. The Congress is very clever – they understood why delimitation had to be delinked from the ongoing census,” he said.
