Parties ignore women in state

None of the political parties, that do a lip service when it comes to women reservation, have fielded even 10 per cent women for the 90 assembly seats in the state.

Tickets give to women in Chhattisgarh
Congress	BJP	NCP	BSP	SP	CPI
8/90	6/90	4/90	5/55	6/70	1/15

Women, who outnumber men in 37 out of the 90 assembly seats in Chhattisgarh still got a raw deal from all major political parties during the ticket distribution. None of the parties gave even 10 per cent tickets to women in the state.

Chhattisgarh has a sex ratio of 1000:990 according to the 2001 census, which is next to the highest literary state of Kerala.

Bharaitya Janata Party, which proposed to give ticket to atleast a woman per district of the state, has in the end fielded only six women. State has 16 districts. Congress gave only eight seats to women while the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) has set aside four constituencies. The BSP, SP and CPI have given 5, 6 and 1 seat respectively

Total voters in Chhattisgarh
Male	6789782	50.23%
Female	6729914	49.77%
Total	13519696	100%

to women.

While only three women on Congress ticket and four on BJP would try their fortune from the 37 women voters' dominated constituencies, there is only one from NCP.

Women almost constitute 50 per cent of the voter's strength in the state. Out of the thirty-seven, there are 18 reserved Scheduled caste/Schedule tribe seats. And interestingly only few from these 37 constituencies fall in the very backward tribal areas.

Women voters, faring better and ranking higher in Gender Development Index in Chhattisgarh, in all likelihood are going to leave impact on the results of several constituencies here, feel political observers here. Women have a say here could be gauged from the relative freedom she enjoys in local traditions and customs.

Political parties are nowhere closer to the proposed bill of providing one-third reservation considered since long for ensuring political empowerment of the women.