Women Reservation Bill is anti minority bill – AIUDF

By TCN News

New Delhi: All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) came out against the proposed Women Reservation bill saying it "is completely against" it in its present form.

Calling it an ‘anti minorities bill’ AIUDF said that this will surly reduce the already negligible minority representation to both lower and upper houses of parliament if it doesn't have representation quota for minority and Dalit women. "AIUDF considers this bill in its present form a mockery with all minorities, Dalit and against the interest of Indian nationhood, and will strongly oppose it in both parliament and streets," said the statement.

Maulana Badruddin Ajmal, AIUDF president and the lone Lok Sabha member from the party who is also president of Assam state Jamiat Ulama-e Hind and a member of Shura (Executive Body) of famous Darul Uloom Deoband said that the women reservation bill in its existing form is simply unacceptable for the minorities especially Muslims. “The bill is actually an anti minority bill in guise of empowerment of women”, he said. It would be a historic blunder repeated once again by this nation if the bill went through to become a law, Maulana Ajmal argued.

It is notable that following India’s independence from colonial clutches and unfortunate partition a historic bill was passed in the constituent parliament of India. It was just after 12 days, on 28th August 1947, a bill was passed to ensure political reservation for scheduled castes (SCs) and the Muslims. During a debate on 'Report on Minority Rights', SCs and Muslims were classified as 'minorities' and the Constituent Assembly passed the bill guaranteeing proportionate reservation for them in the legislative houses.

The next day, some members smartly made an amendment to the bill stating that the SCs were part of the Hindu community and not minority. Maulana Syed Fazlul Hasan Hasrat Mohani (1875–1951), the eminent freedom fighter and a member of constituent assembly which drafted the Indian constitution, objected to the use of word 'minority' for 'Muslims' alone. He said "I refuse to accept Muslims to be a minority. Are we not calling a minority to refer only to Muslims”? Maulana was not allowed to speak further on the subject as the bill was already discussed and passed by the parliament. But unlike other members, he never signed the bill since he saw ‘hypocrisy’ towards Muslim ‘minority’ in it

Two years later, the ‘Muslim’ word removed from the list of reservation beneficiaries. While the SCs, who were technically members of the majority 'Hindu community', are reaping the benefits of reservation till date and the Muslims are forced to live with just the tag of being a 'minority'. The same hypocrisy and political mockery is on play once again by the Brahmical political class of this nation once again.

If religion based reservation is unacceptable for the majority when it comes to political empowerment of minorities then how a gender based casa become rational? AIUDF demands reservation be offered to the weaker sections of the society to genuinely empower them and Muslims are the weakest community by all arguments and statistics therefore reservation bill for Muslim empowerment must follow first. Second, women reservation bill must ensure political representation of women from weaker classes – Muslim, Dalit and other minorities.

If reservation can not go over 50 per cent of total as in the case of 5 per cent Muslim reservation in Andra Pradesh then how 33 per cent more can be ensured in India where it is already around 44-49 in almost all states? Majority of assembly and parliamentary constituencies where a Muslim could easily win from any party if they were general are presently under ST or SC reserved categories. Take the case of Karimganj in Assam where around 60 per cent voters are Muslim with only 20 per cent STs and SCs is a reserved seat since independent. Who knows the remaining Muslim majority voters seats will not be reserved for women only – making way for strong Hindu woman to defeat her weak counter part in the election while enjoying ‘women empowerment’.

AIUDF asked social and political individuals and groups to democratically oppose the present move of UPA government in the national interest.