Two persons go for a job interview. One is a normal, average Joe-looking man, who is very good at this work. The other is a smoking hot blonde who barely knows what she is doing. No prizes for guessing who gets the job.
The Constitution (108th Amendment) Bill, popularly known as the Women's Reservation Bill, seeks to provide thirty three per cent reservation of seats in the Lower house of Parliament (Lok Sabha) and state legislative assemblies for women. If after reading the above story, you jump to the conclusion that I am in the same league as Lalu Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav in opposition to this bill, please hear me out.
There is already a 33% reservation for women in gram panchayats and while it seems to work in some cases, mostly the women are just puppets in the hands of their husbands. Rabri Devi (although not at gram panchayat level) was a burning example of this. The situation in Lok Sabha won't be any different if this bill is implemented.
We all oppose reservation for SC/ST in jobs, and other areas, tooth-and-nail. It breeds inefficiency as undeserving people are given powers that they don't know the value of. Remember that SC/ST boy who got through IIT while you slogged and slogged and couldn't make it and then cursed your caste much to the anger of your grandfather.
Now some would say that not all SC/ST candidates are fools who get through just because of their caste. True. This gives us another point. These reservations lead to undermining of talent of people who really are meritorious and are painted by the same brush as others. Will this not happen in the case of women's reservation also? Food for thought.
Now lets take the above situation inside our family. How would you feel if you not-so-good-at-studies sister got through the college of her choice while you considered going for a sex change. This is almost certain to create family discords and in the already fragile nuclear families, it might be just the last straw.
On a broader scale, if some constituencies are reserved for women, would male voters go to vote? Most people to whom I talked about it said 'No'. Then will this remain the true "democracy" of which we so much like to gloat about?
In a nutshell, this bill denigrates women, undermines their merit, elects inefficient leaders, creates family issues and defeats the very idea of democracy. Reservation for women, anyone?
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