Kochi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday tried to sell a dream not only to his female colleagues but also to the gender rights champions throughout the country as he pushed for more share for women in power structures.
The former Congress president said he wants the party to set a target to have women chief ministers in half of the states it rules in the next 100 years. He was addressing ‘Utsaah’, a convention organised by the Kerala unit of Mahila Congress as part of rejuvenating its organisational machinery.
"Earlier, I was discussing what would be a good target for us to try and achieve, and I thought a good target for the Congress party would be that in 10 years from today, 50 per cent of our chief ministers are women.
"Today, we don't have a single woman chief minister. But I know there are many women in the Congress party who have the qualities to be very good chief ministers," Rahul said, evoking applause from the crowd comprising mostly women.
Rahul was all praise for women as he said he considered them a superior gender. “I think women are superior to men in many ways. They have more patience than men. They have long-term vision than men. They are more sensitive and compassionate than men. We fundamentally believe that women should be part of the power structure," the Wayanad MP said.
Throughout his speech, he repeated his criticism of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the ideological parent of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), terming it a male-dominated organisation.
“In its entire history, RSS has not allowed women into its ranks. When I made this statement a couple of times earlier, RSS said they have women's orgnisations. But the question is not whether they have women’s organisations or not. The question is do women share power in the RSS. The answer is a complete no. What a woman does and what she wears is only her decision. In the RSS they decide what women should do, and wear. If you understand Indian politics deeply then you will see the real fight between the RSS and the Congress is about the role of women in politics,” he said.
Slamming the Narendra Modi-led central government for putting on hold the implementation of the Women's Reservation Bill, Rahul said he had never seen any Bill passed in Parliament which will be implemented a decade later. “The only Bill that the BJP is implementing after 10 years is the one that has to do with women's power," he said.
Mahila Congress state president Jebi Mather MP chaired the meeting. Mahila Congress national president Netta D’Souza, senior Congress leaders K C Venugopal, Tariq Anwar, K Sudhakaran and V D Satheesan were among those who spoke. Mahila Congress activists from across the state attended the event.
