The Supreme Court on January 12 refused to separately hear a writ petition filed by an advocate who wants the law on a 33% quota for women lawmakers to be implemented ahead of next year’s Lok Sabha election.
Instead, a Division Bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta asked advocate M.G. Yogamaya to intervene in a pending petition filed by Congress leader Jaya Thakur, who is seeking the same relief. The petition by Ms. Thakur is likely to come up for hearing on January 16.
“Considering the upcoming general elections in 2024, there is an urgent need for the timely implementation of the Women’s Reservation Bill/Act, 2023 [The Constitution (One Hundred Twenty-Eighth Amendment) Bill, 2023] on the basis of 2001 or 2011 census data under the provisions of Delimitation Act, 2002. Without expeditious action, the benefits of increased women’s representation in the political arena, as envisaged by the Bill, will be lost,” argued Sriram Parakkat, the advocate representing Ms. Yogamaya.
However, Justice Khanna said that the court did not want multiple petitions on the same issue. “You file an intervention application in the petition filed by Jaya Thakur,” he told Mr. Parakkat.
‘Cannot legislate from the Bench’
In November, while hearing Ms. Thakur’s plea, the court had termed the constitutional amendment — which reserves one-third of the seats in Parliament, State legislatures, and the Delhi Legislative Assembly for women — as a “very good step” towards attaining gender parity in politics. Nevertheless, the Bench led by Justice Khanna had voiced doubts about granting any relief ahead of the 2024 general election.
“It will be very difficult for us to do that. It will amount to virtually legislating,” Justice Khanna had remarked.
Ms. Thakur’s plea had questioned a clause in the law which said that the reservation should be implemented only after the next census followed by a delimitation exercise. Her counsel, Vikas Singh, had urged the court to declare the “offending” clause void ab initio, or invalid from the start..
‘Census data not needed’
The petitioner referred to the 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments of 1993 which gave women one-third representation in local body elections. Dr. Thakur also drew the court’s attention to the 77th constitutional amendment extending reservations for promotions in jobs for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Finally, the petition highlighted the recent implementation of the 10% reservation for economically weaker sections (EWS) of society.
The petition emphasised that all these amendments were implemented without calling for census data.
“For the last 75 years there has been no adequate representation of women in the Parliament and State legislatures… This [reservation of seats for women in legislature] has been a long pending demand for decades… In the present amendment, there is no requirement for census figures or for the conduct of delimitation exercise as the number of seats reserved - 33% - is already declared and will be from the existing seats. The Act should be implemented immediately and before the General Elections in letter and spirit,” the petitioner argued.
