Sharad Pawar Backs Naveen’s 33% Quota For Women Proposal

Bhubaneswar: Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president and Rajya Sabha member Sharad Pawar has assured Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik of support to the resolution on 33 per cent reservation for women in Parliament and the state Assemblies.

Congratulating Naveen for his remarkable initiative in this regard in a letter on January 1, Pawar said his party has believed that empowering women is giving them the fair reservation in the legislative decision-making.

Pawar has said that in his fourth term as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra, he had brought legislation in 1991 to pave way for women’s empowerment. In April 2011, the Maharashtra Assembly had unanimously approved 50 per cent reservation for women in all local bodies, including panchayat samitis, zilla parishads and municipal corporations.

Notably, a BJD delegation of Badri Narayan Patra and Arup Patnaik had met Pawar at his residence in Pune on December 15 and handed him a letter of the Chief Minister seeking his support to the proposal.

Naveen had earlier received a support letter from Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh, who in a letter on December 22, had said that his government has already passed a resolution in the recently held session of Punjab Vidhan Sabha urging the Centre to provide 33 per cent reservation for women.

On December 5, the BJD supremo at a meeting with the party vice-presidents and general secretaries had decided to consult the national and regional parties for implementation of its proposal on 33 per cent reservation of seats for women in the state assemblies and Parliament.

Acting on the directive of the Chief Minister, Kalikesh Narayan Singhdeo and Kulamani Samal met CPI’s National Secretary and MP D Raja on December 14. On December 20, Prasanna Acharya, Bhartruhari Mahtab, Pratab Deb, Prasanna Kumar Patasani, Tathagata Satpathy, Sarojini Hembram, Pratyusha Rajeshwari Singh, Anubhav Mohanty and others had met Vice President Venkaiah Naidu.

Besides, Soumya Ranjan Patnaik had met Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and TDP leader Chandrababu Naidu on December 25 while BJD MP Bhartruhari Mahtab had met former Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on January 5.

On January 9, Nagendra Pradhan and Rabindra Jena had met Bihar CM and JD (U) President Nitish Kumar while Pinaki Mishra had met Jammu & Kashmir National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah on January 3.

The Odisha Chief Minister in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 4 had urged him to initiate the move to ensure one-third reservation for women.

He had also written to chief ministers of all states on December 6 seeking their support on this matter.