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Gender and Politics

• Social division based on gender is almost seen everywhere. it is seen as natural and unchangeable.
• Social division is grown as a result of social expectations such as Fashion Industry view women as beauty, In-Law’s view women as source of money, and, commonly known public beliefs i.e. stereotypes such as men are stronger than women, men can do more work than women, girls are not good at sports.

Public / Private Division

• Boys and girls are made to believe that women do housework and bringing up children and men do all the work outside the house. This is known as Sexual Division of Labour.
• Like women men can also do the work inside the house but men simply thinks that it is the work of women.
• Even if women do outside work like working in farm, domestic helper, working in office and earn income still their work is not valued and recognised.
• Even if women are about half of the humanity but still they have minimal role in public life e.g. women can not vote and participate in public affairs.
• Gradually, women from different parts organised themselves and raised movements for their rights such movements are called Feminist Movements.
• In many countries movements was raised for right to vote. With this they demanded improvements in Political and Legal Status and also getting access to education and Career Opportunities.
• In some cases women demanded equality in personal and family life as well.
• It helped to improve women’s role in public life. Today women are working as scientist, doctors, engineers, lawyers, managers and teachers.
• In some countries such as Sweden, Norway and Finland women’s participation in public life is very high.

Gender and Politics : Indian Scenario

• India is male dominated country. The status of women is lagging much behind the men. Even if the status of women is improving after Independence still women are facing disadvantages, discrimination and oppression i.e. unjust treatment in variety of ways such as education, employment, wages, safety and more importantly social mindset.

 

• Literacy: Literacy Rate among men is around 76% however it is just 54% for women. Also very few girls go for higher education. The performance of girls is equal or better than boys but they did not get equal treatment e.g. girls drop out because family want to spend more on boys.

• Employment: Compared to men very few women are working on highly paid and valued jobs. Even if, on an average Indian woman is working one hour more than man but still her work is neither valued nor paid.

 

• Wages: The Equal Remuneration Act, 1976 suggest that equal work should get equal wages. But currently in all areas including sports, cinema, factories and fields women are paid much less than men even for the equal work.
• Safety: Today women are not safe. Cases such as harassment, exploitation and violence against women are very common. Even in their own home women are facing domestic violence such as beating, harassment and many other.
• Social Mindset: Indian Parents prefer to have boy child rather than having a girl child. To avoid girl child, parents do sex selective abortion and kill the girl child before it born. Ultimately such activities lead to decline in child sex ratio i.e. number of girl children per thousand boys. Currently in our country, child sex ratio is just 914. In some regions it is decreased even below 800.

Need to empower Women

• Women’s problems and sufferings are well known yet these are neglected. These issues get solved only after rising of feminist Movements and women’s movements. This indicate that women’s problems will not be solved till women comes in power and therefore there is a need to have more women as elected representatives.

Need of women in legislative bodies

• Involvement of women in legislature i.e. law making bodies of government is very low. For instance, in 2009 it is just 10% of the total in Lok Sabha and 5% of the total in state assemblies. Such percentage also exist even if the woman become the Chief Minister or The Prime Minister.

Need of Reservation for Women

• Women can also be empowered by legally reserving seats for women in elected bodies. Indian government reserved one-third seats for women in local government bodies and in municipalities. As a result today there are more than 10 lakh elected women representatives in rural and urban local bodies.
• Women’s organisation demanded same ⅓ reservation in Lok Sabha and State Assemblies for women. Bill proposal provided about this before a decade is still pending to be actioned.

Conclusion

• Gender division is one of the example of social division. Raising such issues, helped women to get their rights. There are other such divisions such as religion, caste which need to be expressed in politics so that social division would be minimised.

Religion, Communalism and Politics

• India like other countries have different religions. Even within the same religion there are different practices. Such religious differences give rise to Social Division.

Religion and Politics Some Instances:

• Gandhiji used to say that religion can not be separated from politics. By the term ‘religion’ he was pointing towards Moral Values. He believed that moral values can only guide the Politics.
• Most people who are victims of communal violence belong to Religious Minorities. These people have demanded to take necessary steps in regard to protect them.
• Women’s Movement says that Family Laws of all religions makes discrimination against women so these movements demanded that the government should change the laws and make women more equitable.

Positive Effects

• All these instances suggests that Religion and Politics are related. Arguments raised because of religion are not necessarily wrong or dangerous. Perhalfs ideas, ideals and values drawn from a religion can play important role in politics. It helps the people to express their needs, interests and demands for their religious community.

Negative Effects

• often religious activities can lead to violence in the society. Government should keep an eye on religious activities and should not allow religious discrimination and unjust treatment. It will help in bringing equality.

 

Communalism

• India have huge population with varying religious groups. Often beliefs in one religion is expressed as superior than other. As a result religious communities try to express their religion as better than other. Such conditions may also lead to conflicting situations this is called communalism. If government use its power for the benefit of any one religion of its interest, then such situation give rise to communal politics.
• People following different religion can not belong to same social community. If followers of different religions have some commonalities then these are treated as exterior and unimportant.
• Even if we assume that people of same religion have same goals but in reality, interests and wishes are different for different people in same community. Any decision of a community may suppress the voice of an individual belonging to same community.

Forms of Communalism in Politics

• Everyday Beliefs: One’s preconceived opinion about a religion, conventional idea of a religious communities and beliefs of superiority of one’s religion over another are expressed knowingly or unknowingly in daily life.
• Political Dominance: People belonging to majority community try to dominate over other communities while people belonging to minority community try to form separate nation.
• Political Mobilisation: It is a common practice to use sacred symbols, religious leaders, emotional appeal and plain fear so as to assemble people in a community and made them ready for the war.
• Communal Violence: It is the most ugly form of communalism. It involves violence, riots and massive killing. e.g. At the time of partition India and Pakistan suffered such a communal riot. Even after the independence Hindu-Muslim riots are the common cases.

Secular State:

• The makers of our constitution were aware about the challenges to the country because of communalism and hence they proposed model of secular state.
• Indian constitution did not give a special status to any religion. Thus there is no official religion of the country like Buddhism in Sri Lanka, Islam in Pakistan, Christianity in England.
• Indian Constitution provide freedom to practice and propagate religion of interest.
• The constitution does not allow discrimination based on religion.
• Constitution allows the government to intervene in the matters of religion so as to ensure equality. e.g. It bans untouchability.
• Communalism is not only the threat for any one community, instead it is a threat for secularism in India. This need to be eliminated. But for that only Secular Constitution alone is not sufficient, it need to be removed from our daily lives as well as from politics too.

Caste Inequalities

• Social division based on gender and religion is seen throughout the world but, based on caste is only seen in India (Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra)

Casteism in India

• In this type of system peoples belonging to same caste have similar occupation. They form social community based on their caste. people marry within a caste group and neither eat in other caste group nor allow member of other caste group to mix up with them.
• Caste system is based on discrimination and unequal treatment with other caste groups. Upper caste group people usually do inhuman practice of untouchability with people of ‘Outcaste’ groups.

Role of Leaders and Social Reformers

• Political leaders and social reformers such as Jyotiba Phule, Mahatma Gandhi, B. R. Ambedkar and Periyar Ramaswami Naicker worked to reduce the caste inequality in the Nation.
• With the help of political leaders, social reformers and socio-economic changes India is modernising. Also with Economic Development, urbanisation, increasing literacy and education, occupational freedom and Weakening of Landlordism in villages, caste hierarchy is breaking down.

Political Measures

• Indian Constitution also prohibits such caste based discrimination. It has policies to reverse the injustice of the caste system.

Current scenario of Caste Inequality

• Even with such measures the caste system is yet not completely disappeared. Older aspects of caste still exists. People belonging to a caste marry within their cast only. Despite of constitutional prohibition, untouchability still exists.
• From older times through the caste system some castes are gaining advantages while other are facing disadvantages. e.g. those having access to education in older time are performing well in modern education too however those who did not have access are still lagging behind.
• worked to reduce the caste inequality in the Nation
• In current India, caste is continued to be closely linked to economic status. In that sense people belonging to upper caste have good economic conditions while those belonging to lower class have poor economic conditions. It is because from older times upper caste peoples have access to resources such as land, education while those belonging to lower classes did not.
• Caste Inequality is threat to India’s equality and hence need to be eliminated.

Caste in Politics

Introduction

• The belief that casteism is the only basis of social community is wrong. Caste is one aspect of our life but it is not the most important aspect.

Forms of Caste in Politics:

• When political parties choose a candidate they selects one belonging to majority caste people so as to win in election. Political parties also give a place to different representatives of castes and tribes.
• Political parties and candidates often use caste sentiments to get support of respective caste people. Sometimes such parties are seen as representatives of the caste.
• Universal adult franchise i.e. people having the right to vote and one-person-one-vote system made political leaders to think in the direction of gaining their support. It Also bring consciousness among people of lower castes.

Is election all about Castes:

• In politics, many times to win election, special focus is given towards caste, so it might develop and impression that election is all about caste. But it is not true.
• In India no parliamentary constituency has clear majority of single caste hence to win election representatives need to gain the support of more than one caste.
• Any party could not win the votes of all the voters belonging to a caste. When large proportion of voters of a caste vote for the party then such caste is called ‘Vote Bank’ of the party.
• If in a parliamentary constituency a specific caste is major then different political parties may put up candidate from the same caste. There may be another scenario that voters did not have           candidates belonging to their caste.
• Many times we find that ruling party and the sitting MP or MLA often lose election. If election is all about caste then these will never lose the election.

Other factors that matters electoral politics

• There are other factors e.g. voters may have stronger attachment to political parties than their own caste or community.
• Economy of voters belonging to same caste may be different and hence their requirements and demand will be different.
• Gender based social division can also influence election.
• People’s assessment in terms of performance and popularity of a political party become major decision maker in election.
• It is true that caste can influence Politics. But also Politics too can influence the caste system and caste identities, by bringing the caste into Political Level.

 

Forms of Politics in Caste : Politics can influence caste in various forms such as

• Expansion of Caste: Each caste tries to become bigger by combining similar castes or sub-castes that were not related earlier.
• Joining with other castes: Single caste can not win election so to become stronger they try to  join other castes and hence enter into dialogue and negotiation.
• New Caste groups: New kinds of caste groups such as ‘Backward’ and ‘Forward’ are come up in politics.

Role of Caste in Politics:

• Helpful for Disadvantaged communities: Sometimes expression of caste differences in politics help the disadvantaged communities to demand their rights. E.g. People from Dalits and OBC caste got better access to Decision Making.
• Demand for end of Discrimination: Many political and non-political organisations demands the end of discrimination so that lower caste people would get Dignity, access to Land, Resources and Opportunities.
• Negative Impacts: It is also possible that giving exclusive attention to caste will lead to negative impacts. Such as diverting the attention from issues such as Poverty, Development and Corruption. Sometimes it can also lead to Tension, Conflict and even Violence.