Image Courtesy:hindustantimes.com
Days before International Women’s Day on March 8, 2022, the Election Commission of India (ECI) reported on women’s enthusiastic participation in Assembly elections across five states. While, the gender-wise break-up of votes is still pending for the seventh phase of the Uttar Pradesh elections, the data so far shows that women in Manipur had the highest turnout at 89.94 percent, followed by 80.96 percent turnout of women voters in Goa and 67.2 percent turnout of women voters in Uttarakhand.
During the virtual International Election Visitors Programme (IEVP) 2022 hosted by the ECI, Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra spoke about consistent efforts to ensure the participation of women voters. This included more women polling officers and workers at the voting area In an earlier press note, the ECI ensured at least one polling station managed exclusively by women in every assembly constituency to prove its commitment towards gender equality. All election staff here, including police and security personnel, were women. Chandra reported that women’s voter turnout in Uttarakhand was 67.2 percent, more than the 62.6 percent men’s voter turnout. Similarly, Goa recorded 80.96 percent women’s turnout as opposed to 78.19 percent men’s voter turnout.
Further, during the sixth phase of UP elections, women voters were 62.62 percent whereas men voters were 51.03 percent. In fact, Times of India reported that UP reported higher women’s voter turnout during the fourth, fifth and sixth phase of state election with the details of the last phase pending. The report also said that Manipur women voters (89.94 percent) led with a 2.74 percent lead as men’s voter turnout was 87.2 percent. However in Punjab, the gender competition was neck and neck with women’s voter turnout at 71.91 percent and men’s voter turnout at 71.99 percent.
Once again, the ECI has not included transgender or non-binary genders in its voting data. In January, The Tribune spoke to the transgender community in Amritsar to highlight how the people are aware of the electoral process but shy away form voting due to social stigma. On the flipside, the Times of India reported in February how transgender person Heena was excited to vote for the first time as her identified third gender. Around March 6, Amar Ujala reported how there were around 42 third gender persons in Uttari and 36 third gender persons in Cantt, but could not replicate the voter turnout post-polling due to lack of data. This indicates both the lack of representation and the continued social stigma faced by the LGBTQ+ community, especially transgender people, in India even though their voting right is acknowledged both by the Indian Constitution and the Supreme Court in 2014.
Across the nation, transgender communities particularly face issues of unemployment, education, access to clean water, toilets of their preferred gender expression and similar facilities and social acceptance.
Grievances of women polling officers
While the ECI boasted how the process was made more accessible to women through focused efforts, workers pointed out that the same attention was not paid to the employees.
Anganwadi workers and ASHAs were put on polling duty throughout elections. Some were asked to check the temperature of voters while others helped people find their respective polling booths. Yet, in all this, anganwadi workers reported they were not paid for their labour. Further they were also not offered food or water unlike the teaching staff and security personnel who had tiffins arranged for them. ASHAs and anganwadi workers had to walk to their assigned voting area. At times, this area was too far to travel by foot but workers said they were not reimbursed for their travel expenses.
An anganwadi worker in Rampur said that the promised payment for election work was less than the ₹700 promised in 2017. However, this year workers did not even receive that. She demanded her due, pointing out that a person should be paid according to the work they have put in.
Similarly, in Gonda, mid-day meal cooks were put on election duty and told to prepare meals for polling officers travelling to the area. Again, these workers were not paid and asked to arrange for any excess raw material themselves. It may be noted that a majority of ASHAs, anganwadi workers and mid-day meal workers are women or widowed women who depend on the meagre government wages for their livelihood. The community has wholly condemned the government for lagging in their payment both during election time and before.
Grievances of Muslim women voters
The Muslim community forms a sizeable chunk of UP’s population. It is thus important to note how the women from this community have faced persisting hate over the years. Most recently RSS-affiliated groups started a campaign to raise the marriage age of Muslim women, citing Shariat laws as dated and hindering progress. This despite earlier criticisms by women’s groups on how a higher marriage age does the bare minimum for women empowerment.
The right-wing group did not address the real trials faced by Muslim women such as communal aggressions in UP since 2017. For example, the labelling of Muslims as traitors by BJP MLAs and veiled comments on Muslim women by none other than Union Home Minister Amit Shah in his oft used phrase of ‘Alia, Malia, Jamalia’. This is also nothing compared to the blatantly sexualised targeting on social media and via apps like S**li Deals and B**li Bai.
Aside from this, the women face great economic threats especially after the Covid-19 pandemic. In CJP’s study titled Purvanchal: Silence of the Looms, women weaver’s who hail from the Muslim community spoke about how they struggled to get work as domestic helps, let alone their primary profession. Weavers in the region estimated a loss of a staggering ₹ 3,000 cr in eastern UP’s handicraft, handloom and power loom business during and after the lockdown. However, it is worth discussing how much this hurt the woman weavers considering their work was unpaid and dismissed as house work.
Aside from these, Muslim children also suffer from malnutrition and poor health. Only recently, anganwadi workers of Bulandshahr reported how they were in a scuffle with the local community due to insufficient nutrition packages for their children.
These realities remind that despite improving representation in the electoral process, the administration is yet to adequately address women’s issues, and therefore, must stop patting its own back for small achievements.
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