Women's Reservation Bill wrt Women's Votes 270923copy on Commcomm

  Women's Voting Rights In Elections

    My little girl asked me a question last night about why women were not allowed to vote in the begini8ng years of the previous century. This was my reply:

    Right from the ancient times, Indian (and therefore the Aryan) method of united living was to involve all the households in the process of decision making. This was done through the Panchayat system. There the elders of the household gathered to formulate laws, policies and plans and the decisions were executed through the elders onto each household. Earlier, the elders were free to gather together for such long and intriguing discussions while the younger people went about their day-to-day work. Then, there was need for some critical decisions to be adopted only as per confirmed majority of the households to be willing to get involved in it (e.g. engaging into a war, adopting some Uniform Civil Code, etc.) because with a large number of households not getting involved would mean an alarming loss of power and increased risk of loss. So, the presence of every household and their consequent vote became the mode of social decision making. Here too, the focus was to garner support and involvement of each household.

    But then this system  was considered inappropriate as some families contributed one head for one male adult in the family, some contributed five heads for five male adults in the family and some others contributed only one head for five male adults in the family. So unevenness was unpalatable in mutual relations and even though the elders were good enough to keep the family and the society together, incidents do happen (these happened for Lord Rama as well). So the next development was to involve all adult male as voters and the accumulated votes would stand up for the cause if required. Hence the system of voting by all adult males was promulgated as the standard form for all issues. The ladies were not required to stand up in public as it was mutually understood by one and all that the 'ardhangini' (the wife) would join with the husband in all deeds and therefore not required to be explained the pros and cons of each case and vote after understanding these and thinking about her family situation with  respect to these matters. Similarly, unwed adult females (which were normally nil) were also not burdened to participate. Single widows were not bothered as well. So, in those times, women's voting was not required at all.

    These necessities were acutely required in the Western World and especially in the US when the war ravaged countries with lots of widows and single married/unmarried adult working/non-working females to take care of were required to involve women into the voting system and into the Government so that they could voice their difficulties and dangers straight to the Government and to their Societies in their Countries. Thus came up the issue of allowing women into elections both as a Candidate as well as a Voter.

    So, in modern times, all democratic methods require women to vote as well as permit women to contest in the elections.       

    I hope the historians and the lawmakers would approve my views. However, any contradictory comment are welcome as well.   IPYadav