As the Women's Reservation Bill has been tabled in Parliament, the debate over the representation of OBC and minority women has started to again gain strength. For the last 27 years, there were two major contentions regarding the bill. The first was the sub-quota for the SC/ST women and the second was the reservation of women from OBC and minority communities. While the current Bill gives 33 per cent reservation to women belonging to SC/ST community within the pre-existing reserved category, women from OBCs and minorities are nowhere in the scene. Alongside SP and RJD, Congress has also joined the bandwagon to demand representation of OBC and minority women. However, Mayawati has taken a U-turn and said that her party would support the bill without any precondition.
In this context, the question arises, whether reservation will actually help women from the marginalised sections. And will the subalterns be heard?
