Hyderabad:A map-based report curated by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and UN Women has ranked India at 140th spot among 186 nations ranked for the representation of women in Parliament and 171st in representation of women in Union Cabinet. The report -'The Women in politics: 2023' presented new data in executive positions and national parliaments, as on Jan. 1.
More women than ever are in political decision-making roles worldwide, but gender parity is still a long way off, according to the 2023 @IPUparliament & @UN_Women Map of Women in Politics, UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous wrote in Twitter sharing a link to the complete map.
India's abysmal statistics-India lags behind Pakistan, Bangladesh and China from the Asian sub-continent in sending women to the parliament. As per the report, there are 82 women among 542 members in the Lower House of the Parliament. This works out to 15.1 per cent representation. It further dips in the Upper House or Council of States which has only 33 women among 239 members with a strike rate of 13.8 per cent. As for Sri Lanka, it trails India at 179th rank and India's landlocked neighbour Nepal is ranked 54th, as of Jan. 1. Rwanda has come out on top followed by Cuba, Nicaragua, Mexico, New Zealand and United Arab Emirate, the latter three share the 4th rank.
Toppers-Rwanda occupies the top spot and has 49 women members in the 80-member Lower House and has 9 members in the Upper House or Senate which has a total membership of 26. Cuba has single House system in which 313 of 586 are women members. Mexico (250 women members in Lower House, which accounts for 50 per cent) and (64 in Upper House, slightly over 50 per cent), New Zealand and U.A.E has 60 and 20 women members in the Single House and account for 50 per cent membership.
A snapshot on how women representation fare across the globe in the parliaments.
Women in Cabinet-As regards to the representation in the Union Cabinet, India has only two ministers in the rank of Cabinet. This makes India share 171 spot with Dominican Republic. There are 30 Ministers in the Modi-led Union Cabinet. The percentage of women Cabinet ministers is pegged at 6.7. Nepal sits at 120th rank while Bangladesh is ranked 155 followed by Pakistan ranked 161 from the sub-continent. Sri Lanka occupies the last spot and shares it eight other countries with zero representation of women in the Cabinet.
Cabinet Toppers-There are thirteen which has women representation in Cabinet breaching 50 per cent and above. Albania stays on top with 8 of its 12 Cabinet ministers being women followed by Finland whose Cabinet size is 14 while 9 of them are women. Spain has 14 women among 22-member Cabinet, Nicaragua (10/16), Liechtenstein (3/5), Chile (14/24), Belgium (8/14), Mozambique (11/20), Andorra (6/12), Colombia (9/18), Germany (8/16), Netherlands (6/12) and Norway (9/18).
A snapshot on women representation in the highest positions of State.
Data in nutshell-The report released by the UN Women said women are still underrepresented at all levels of decision-making worldwide and that achieving gender parity in political life is far off. 31 countries have women as either Heads of State and/or Government and women work out to 26.5 per cent of Members of Parliament while less than one in four Cabinet Ministers is a woman (22.8 per cent). As per the report, women lead important human rights, gender equality, and social protection policy portfolios, while men dominate policy areas like defence and economy.
