Thaindian News

New Delhi, March 23 (IANS) The Mahila Congress Tuesday urged Congress party president Sonia Gandhi to ask the government to bring a bill providing for 33 percent job quota for women in the central government and in the party-ruled states.
The Mahila Congress, a women’s wing of the All India Congress Committee (AICC), also urged the Congress president to ask all party-led states to pass laws providing 33 percent reservation for women in government jobs.

The two resolutions, seeking the party chief’s intervention to prevail upon the central and state governments to introduce 33 percent quota for women in government jobs, were passed at the national council meeting of the Mahila Congress here.

“These steps will go a long way in empowering the women economically,” Mahila Congress chief Prabha Thakur told IANS after the meeting.

Thakur, who met Sonia Gandhi along with AICC general secretary Mohsina Kidwai and other office-bearers, said they expressed their gratitude to the Congress president for the passage of the women’s reservation bill in the Rajya Sabha.

“The bill fulfils the dreams of the country’s women who represent half the population. It has been passed in the Rajya Sabha because of the unshakable commitment and indefatigable efforts of the Congress president,” Thakur said.

She said a big thanksgiving rally of women has been planned in the capital before the budget session of parliament resumes on April 15.

Thakur, a Rajya Sabha member from Rajasthan, said assurance for providing reservation to women in government jobs finds a place in the Congress manifesto for 2009 general elections.

“The Mahila Congress feels grateful that the Congress president accepted our demand and put it in the 2009 Lok Sabha election manifesto.”

The Congress manifesto states that the party “proposes to reserve one-third of all government jobs for women.”