Yesterday, the headlines across many major dailies flashed a title that raised questions among many well-reasoned readers – ‘Opposition stands, Women’s bill falls’, suggested one of India’s most read papers, with 1.6 million readers, referring to the defeat of the passage of the 131st Constitution Amendment Bill and two other legislations. Bundled together, these bills, different from the Women’s Reservation Bill already passed in 2023, sought to expand Lok Sabha’s strength to 850 members and remove the requirement that delimitation be based on post-2026 census data, thereby permitting the use of existing figures.
Much of the passion around the issue of women’s reservation in legislatures comes from a long, embattled history of demands – where once during the constitution framing by a ‘gentleman’s agreement’, women Constituent Assembly members trusted that the system would automatically ensure representation. By 1996, only 6.5 percent of legislators were women.
But passions can also erode a lot of fine print. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s long address on Saturday caustically accused the Opposition of “committing a foeticide of the idea of women’s representation before the whole world, via their opposition to the move”. But it completely dodged the more significant conversation on delimitation and the unretractable bending of India’s federal and democratic structure that was really at stake. Now, in an era of wide-scale misreporting on how our legislations or our Constitution Amendment Bills are passed and how the understanding of the masses is shaped, responsible and explanatory legal reporting holds up a tremendous burden.
The Leaflet has borne some of this responsibility – decoding the finer print major dailies deliberately missed to see. Our in-depth explainer on the now-defeated Bill, and how exactly it used women’s reservation as a ‘cover’ reached over 12,000 readers – sharply capturing concerns around transparency, simplifying the pre-legislative process and collating a neat tabulation of the changes the Amendment would have brought.
Beyond explanations that decode the fine print, we platformed deeper discussions on the Amendment’s constitutional position and how women’s representation can be achieved without a large and unwieldy Lok Sabha, without penalising southern Indian states for population control. Senior Advocate Mohan Katarki’s insightful essay, last week, laid out three hypothetical futures, and is a must read:
Catching the finer print is something we have done not just on the biggest constitutional challenges confronting us, but even the more localised concerns in the legal community that often miss public attention. After a major daily misreported serious agitations in a Tamil Nadu law school following sexist remarks by the VC (who blamed female students of ‘invit[ing] sexual harassment’ by wearing shorts), The Leaflet dived into the story and came back with even harrowing details – like how the administration even called up parents of protesting students, warning them of consequences. As faculty and registrar kept trying to justify the VC’s remarks, we saw little regret in actually acknowledging what was said. Students have continued their protest. Read Tanishka Shah’s report here:
And just as well, like parliamentary developments and law school protests, the fine print of what unfolds in our Supreme Court is something we are very careful about. The Sabarimala Reference hearings have now stretched on for five long days. While Review Petitioners are yet to conclude, the door for many debates have opened up – on the meaning of ‘morality’, on the relationship between Articles 25 and 26, and on whether this hearing is a stepping stone to maybe revisit many landmark rulings of the last decade. Read our entire coverage:
On Constitutional Morality
On Article 25, Denominations and the infamous Essential Religious Practices Test
Books
This week, we are reading journalist Jyoti Yadav’s new book – ‘Faith and Fury’ – a diary of reportages on the COVID 19 pandemic and the rapid misgovernance that plagued the country and cost lakhs of lives. Read an excerpt published in The Leaflet last week on how policing, laws and courts shaped governance in Uttar Pradesh amid massive oxygen shortage.