Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram on Sunday backed Rahul Gandhi in his war of words with Union Minister Kiren Rijiju over women’s reservation, accusing the Centre of “unnecessarily and mischievously” linking its implementation to the contentious delimitation exercise.
The Rajya Sabha MP said Rijiju was “wrong” to suggest that the Congress needed to support a Women’s Reservation Bill, pointing out that the law providing 33 per cent reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and state Assemblies had already been passed in 2023 as the 106th Constitutional Amendment.
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“The Women’s Reservation Bill was passed in 2023. It was unnecessarily and mischievously linked to the Census and Delimitation by the BJP government,” Chidambaram said in a post on X.
“We had pointed this out in 2023, but the government was adamant because it had a hidden agenda. Snap this linkage,” he added, arguing that the quota could be implemented before the 2029 Lok Sabha elections.
RAHUL-RIJIJU X SPAT
Chidambaram’s intervention came a day after Gandhi and Rijiju traded barbs over the women’s quota and the Centre’s move to link its rollout to delimitation.
The exchange began after Rijiju shared a video of Gandhi speaking about giving women greater freedom of expression and suggested there had been a “visible change of heart” in the Leader of the Opposition.
“This seems to be a positive message from the Congress. There’s a visible change of heart in Rahul Gandhi about women,” Rijiju said, while urging the party to support women’s reservation “unconditionally”.
The Leader of Opposition responded within hours, reminding the Parliamentary Affairs Minister that the legislation had already been passed with the Congress’s support.
“The Bill has already been passed unanimously, with the full support of the Congress,” he said.
Gandhi then turned the question back on the government.
“Why has it still not been implemented even after three years, and why do you now want to unnecessarily link it to delimitation?” the Lok Sabha MP asked, demanding that the 2023 law be implemented “without any conditions.”
KARTI CHIDAMBARAM’S MESSAGE TO DMK, TDP
Meanwhile, Congress MP Karti P Chidambaram warned regional parties against backing the BJP’s reported proposal for a uniform 50 per cent increase in Lok Sabha seats, arguing that it would still widen the numerical gap between northern and southern states and leave the South politically weaker.
In a post on X, the Sivaganga MP said parties such as the DMK and TDP were being “led down the garden path” by what he called the BJP’s promise of an “illusory” uniform increase in seats across states.
According to Chidambaram Jr, the BJP was attempting to reassure regional parties that it could avoid redistributing seats purely on the basis of population by instead increasing every state’s representation by 50 per cent.
“A larger Parliament will be an ineffective Parliament. No meaningful time will be available to any member. And the delta between the South and the North in terms of absolute numbers will widen. In a parliamentary democracy, absolute numbers matter,” he wrote on X.
He also opposed linking women’s reservation to delimitation, calling it a “sleight of hand”.
The Lok Sabha MP argued that 181 of the existing 543 Lok Sabha seats could be reserved for women without increasing the size of the House or altering the current distribution of seats among states.
DELIMITATION AT HEART OF ROW
The political sparring comes amid a wider standoff over delimitation, with several southern parties fearing that a fresh redrawing of constituencies could tilt parliamentary representation further in favour of the more populous northern states.
The government, however, maintains that the 33 per cent reservation for women can be implemented fairly only after a fresh delimitation exercise.
Rijiju has reached out to Gandhi more than once over the past week seeking Opposition support for a constitutional amendment linking the two issues, even as the Monsoon Session has remained largely stalled since July 20.
The BJP-led NDA does not have the two-thirds majority required to pass a constitutional amendment on its own, making Opposition support crucial.
The Congress, meanwhile, insists that women’s reservation should be implemented separately and without being tied to delimitation.
– Ends
SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
