JUNE 2021

PARLIAMENTARY RESEARCH
AND TRAINING INSTITUTE FOR
DEMOCRACIES (PRIDE)

PREPARED BY:
Vartika Neeraj

ANALYSING GENDER
EQUALITY DISCUSSIONS
DURING THE ZERO-HOUR
(1999-2018)
SUMMARY
With over 14% (78 MPs) female MPs, the current Lok Sabha has the highest number of
women MPs since 1952. In State assemblies–only 9% of 4,120 MLAs were women.

The number of female-centred questions during the zero hour have increased exponentially
from 2000 to 2018, showing an increase of 168% in 18 years.

3.04% of the total zero hour questions related to gender equality during term 13, 4% during
term 14, 5.5% during term 15 and 7.2% during term 16.

In term 13, 12.44% of the female-centric questions were asked by women when they only
constituted 9.9% of the total house. Similarly, term 14, term 15 and term 16 witnessed
12.15%, 20.3%, and 22.3% of the questions on gender equality being asked by women when
they only occupied 9.5%, 11.4% and 12.1% of the house respectively.

The three most mentioned domains during zero hour questions have been education
(ministry of HRD), healthcare (ministry of HFW) and the dedicated women's ministry (WCD).
In recent years, home affairs has also emerged as an integral issue, ranking at the fourth
position-- this comes in the context of increasing crimes against women that are addressed
by this department.

The Ministry of Women and Child Development was created in 2006, around the 14th Term
of the Lok Sabha. The findings reveal that ever since its creation, the majority of the
questions related to female-centric issues have been directed to the MWCD with term 14
witnessing 461 questions, term 15 having 1222 and term 16 recording 1246 questions

Novel fields of discussion include female entrepreneurship, skill development, digital

literacy, cyber harassment, mental health, reproductive health and minority rights to name
a few.

HEIMAN SOFTWARE LABS PAGE 01

 NEERAJ 1

Vartika Neeraj
PRIDE Internship Project
10th June 2020

Analysing Gender Equality Discussions during the Zero-Hour (1999-2018)

PART I: Theoretical Framework
1. Introduction
Women have seen increasing stakes in Indian electoral politics with an increasing number of candidates
being fielded along with female-centric issues finding mentions in campaigning and policy programmes.
Between 1957 and 2019, the number of women contestants has increased from 45 to 724, demonstrating a
15 fold increase in the number of women contesting1. Despite these advances, the case of India remains
paradoxical as several women have become top ministers (including former Prime Minister Indira
Gandhi), but the overall percentage of women in parliament has remained low2. This is especially
worrisome when we realise that the dearth of female parliamentarians could directly negatively impact
policies promoting gender equality. Studies analysing ‘who represents and how’3 have found that women
legislators are more active in speaking on behalf of women and children than male legislators. These MPs
have been more focused on discussing the rehabilitation of victims and expanding the scope of rights and
rights-holders.

This paper will attempt to empirically analyse the present situation and impact of female parliamentarians.
Specifically, it will attempt to empirically understand the influence women members of parliament have
had in the lower house with respect to voicing gender-issues. We will specifically study the zero hour
discussions from 1999-2018 to reflect on this theme. First, we will quantitatively study the mention of
female-issues in this time frame and then briefly discuss the substantial nature of the themes brought up
during zero hours. The paper will essentially hope to highlight margins for improvement in promoting
discussions around gender equity in the parliament and make a case for enhanced female representation.
The next section gives a brief history of female parliamentarians across the world and in India, to provide
a global framework to assess the country’s performance.

1
https://www.behanbox.com/2020/06/29/women-mps-in-lok-sabha-how-have-the-numbers-changed/
2
https://thewire.in/women/women-parliament-lok-sabha-rajya-sabha-politica-parties
3
Sadhvi Kalra, Devin K. Joshi, Gender and parliamentary representation in India: The case of violence against
women and children, Women's Studies International Forum, 2020
 NEERAJ 2

2. Female Parliamentarians: A Brief Background

While more women than ever are being elected to parliaments around the world, equality is still a long
way off, and current progress is far too slow. Most parliaments are still heavily male-dominated, and some
have no women MPs at all4. Even where women are present in greater numbers, glass ceilings often
remain firmly in place. Women running for election face numerous challenges—including addressing
discrimination or cultural beliefs that limit women’s role in society, balancing private, family and political
life, gaining support from political parties and securing campaign funding. They may also face violence,
harassment and intimidation. Some women may even be dissuaded from running for office, leaving men
in the positions of power.

According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, global averages for female parliamentarians across countries
present a grim picture. On an average, only 25.6% of the total parliamentarians globally are women--
25.6% for lower chambers and unicameral legislatures and 24.8% for the upper chambers. The figures
fluctuate regionally with developed areas of the Americas and Europe accounting for 32.1% and 30.6%
female MPs respectively. On the other hand, Asia and the Middle East North Africa (MENA) registered
weaker performances with 20.8% and 19.3% respectively.

4
https://www.ipu.org/resources/publications/reference/2016-07/plan-action-gender-sensitive-parliaments
 NEERAJ 3

Amongst the developed and effective democracies, the following currently hold top rank in female elected
representatives; (i) New Zealand (48.3%), (ii) Sweden (47%), (iii) South Africa (46.5%), (iv) Finland
(46%), and (v) Norway (44.4%).

Similarly, the following register the lowest ranks amongst the functional democracies of the world; (i)
Japan (9.9%), (ii) India (14.4%), (iii) Brazil (15.2%), (iv) Turkey (17.2%), and Republic of Korea (19%).

Other notable rankings according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union include the United States of America
(27.2%), Germany (31.5%), United Kingdom (33.9%), France (39.5%), Canada (29.6%) and Australia
(31.1%).

India has been recorded as one of the weakest performers in terms of achieving equity in parliamentary
representation for women. The next section discusses this situation in brief detail.

2.2 The Case of India: Women in Politics

When India’s first Lok Sabha was formed after the 1952 general elections, 5% of the members were
female5. Though the number was low–reflective of the deeply entrenched patriarchy in India’s society–it
is worth noting that India was ahead of western and seasoned democracies of the time like the US and the
UK. Merely 3% of the UK’s parliament and 2% of the US House of Representatives was female.

5
N. Ahmed, Parliaments in South Asia, Routledge, London (2020)
 NEERAJ 4

Note: The results of the 2019 elections have been added to the third phase. Candidate data for 1952 and
1971 has not been included as it has not been made available by the ECI. Source: Data from ECI and The
Verdict by Prannoy Roy and Dorab Sopariwala.

Even currently (2002-2019), the percentage of women MPs in the Lok Sabha continues to be appallingly
low at 10%. With over 14% (78 MPs) female MPs, the current Lok Sabha has the highest number of
women MPs since 1952. Despite this, India’s women’s representation record is anything but impressive.
The situation is even worse in state assemblies–only 9% of 4,120 MLAs were women, according to an
ADR report6. One of the key reasons behind this is that parties both at the national and regional level field
very few women candidates. Nine out of ten candidates in the Lok Sabha elections have been men7. The
statistics at the assembly level are even more worrisome. Even in the best phase for women candidates
(2002-2019), only one in 12 candidates (8%) in assembly elections have been women.

The low data points on female MPs can be directly juxtaposed with the growing number of women voters
in the country. In 2019, the share of women voters had shot up exponentially by nearly 20% to 67.18%
since the last election cycle. During the same period, men’s turnout grew by only 5%—from 62.1% in
1962 to 67.08% in 20198. The differential growth rate in voter turnout resulted in a watershed moment in
India’s electoral history in 2019; for the first time, women’s turnout percentage in Lok Sabha elections
was marginally higher than men’s.

The success achieved by reserving one-third of the seats in local government bodies like panchayats and
municipalities is often cited as a model which can be emulated at the national level by reserving seats in
the Lok Sabha and state legislatures. As of February 20209, there were more than 2,50,000 local
government bodies across India with nearly 3.1 million elected representatives and 1.3 million women
representatives. Further, reports suggest that women councillors in local government bodies have seen
remarkable success. Data emerging from our seven councillor report cards spread across three terms show
that the women councillors are now outperforming their male counterparts consistently-- in 2019, the
female councillors scored 60.28% while the male councillors scored 59.98%. In a research paper by
Esther Duflo and Raghabendra Chattopadhyay10, it is shown that in a randomised trial in West Bengal,

6
https://www.theleaflet.in/the-crisis-of-under-representation-of-women-in-parliament-and-assemblies/
7
Ibid
8
https://indianexpress.com/elections/bihar-elections-more-women-voters-step-out-nda-80-seats-in-constituencies-wit
h-higher-women-turnout-7049814/
9
https://idronline.org/idr-explains-local-government-in-india/
10
https://www.livemint.com/opinion/columns/opinion-india-needs-more-women-parliamentarians-1550514703491.h
tml
 NEERAJ 5

women pradhans (heads of village panchayats) focus on infrastructure that is relevant to the needs of
rural women, suggesting women leaders can in fact enhance the female quality of life in the country.
Findings like this make a strong case for promoting enhanced representation of women in the lower house
of the parliament.

3. Defining Female-Centric Issues

Female participation in electoral politics has steadily been increasing over the past decade with several
parties including female issues in their election manifestos and increasing the number of women they give
tickets to. While this upward trajectory strengthens India’s democratic character, it is essential to
deep-dive into the theme to analyse the reality of gender-equity in representative politics.

The number of female parliamentarians remains a concern in the Lok Sabha, with women members
accounting for merely 13% of the total members in the current house. However, this number has shown
slight increases from 1999 to 2018 (13th Term to 16th Term) as depicted in the graph below.

The following is the tally of female MPs out of the total 543 members.
Term 13: 54, Term 14: 52, Term 15: 62, Term 16: 66
While female representation has shown slight increases, it is imperative to understand whether this has
made a difference in the number and themes of the questions being raised around women’s issues.

The following graphs showcase the number of questions asked during the zero hours that were focused on
women’s issues spreading over several themes including healthcare, acts of violence, education and
 NEERAJ 6

employment opportunities to name a few (the paper will discuss the substantive elements of these
questions at length in a later segment).

The operative theme of this paper is to analyse ‘female-centric issues’ as they have come up in the zero
hour discussions of the lower house. This is a vast theme and encompasses several criteria from
healthcare, political representation, education, skill development, crimes against women, and
discrimination in the work place to name a few. The following are some selected highlights to shed light
on the degree of gender-inequity in the country;

● Over the last few decades, with multiple state-led child education programmes targeting school
enrolment levels, the enrolment rate for females have gone up in the primary schooling system,
supplemented with a drop in the child dropout ratio for girls. Despite this success, the challenge
has been to substantially increase the female enrolment rate in secondary and tertiary education,
where one can observe a significant gender divide, affecting the overall female literacy rates.
Only 6.72% of adults (25+ women have bachelors-level education while 11.49% of men had
access to this11.

● The lag in women’s access to basic social opportunities presents enormous challenges for women
when it comes to being absorbed by the organised working population, thereby forcing most
women to work in the unregimented informal sector. In addition, the youth unemployment rate
for females (ages 12-24) too has considerably gone up over the last decade12. The unemployment
rate for women has gone up from 10.41% to 11.5% from 2005 to 2010. Further, according to
World Bank data, only 43.13% women had access to an account (banking) at a financial
institution compared to 62.79% men13.

● If we observe trends in healthcare indicators like mortality rates, adolescent fertility rate, life
expectancy for females and so on, the overall situation for females continues to get worse across
India. Despite upward trends in mortality rates, life expectancy and adolescent fertility rate, the
progress has staggered with each year witnessing less 0-0.5% improvement annually14. Further,
of all health workers in the country, nearly two thirds are men. This especially affects rural areas

11
https://thewire.in/economy/ten-charts-gender-inequality
12
https://www.orfonline.org/research/literacy-in-india-the-gender-and-age-dimension-57150/
13
https://thewire.in/economy/ten-charts-gender-inequality
14
https://thewire.in/economy/ten-charts-gender-inequality
 NEERAJ 7

where it has been found that out of all doctors, only 6 percent are women15. Moreover, every year,
23 million girls in India drop out of school after they begin menstruating due to lack of sanitary
napkin dispensers and overall hygiene awareness in schools16.

● Domestic violence and acts of physical,psychological and sexual violence against women is a
major problem in India. According to the latest NCRB report, 2019 saw over 4 lakh reported
cases of crimes committed against women, up from 3.78 lakh in 2018 and 3.59 lakh cases in
2017. NCRB reported 32,033 rape cases which translates to a shocking 88 rape cases a day -- and
this is just 10% of all crimes against women. One reason for this is the poor conviction rate and
the long road to justice. In 2018 and 2019, the conviction rate for rape was below 30%. Which
means out of 100 cases only 30 saw convictions. Absence of forensic labs, fast-track courts and
investigators are also partly responsible for this17.

Thus far, the paper has given a brief overview of the situation of parliamentary representation of women
in the country, given theoretical foundations to establish that enhanced female representation will result in
more conversations around gendered issues and provided a contextual background of gendered issues.

The next section will attempt to explain the research model deployed in this paper wherein we analyse
zero hour questions from 1999-2019 to see how women’s issues have been brought up over the years.
This is especially done in relation to the marginally growing number of female MPs, to establish whether
their enhanced presence has resulted in more female-centric questions being brought up during the zero
hour. The discussion will then move on to data findings and analysis to understand how such discussions
have evolved during zero hour discussions from 1999-2018.

PART 2: Data Findings

4. Research Model for the Study

The paper considers zero hour sessions during term 13 (1999-2004), term 14 (2004-2009), term 15
(2009-2014) and term 16 (2014-2019) to study how female issues have evolved during this period. We
leave out the ongoing session (term 17) due to lack of data and the evolving nature of the current house
debates. The study primarily attempts to answer the following questions;

15
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21227499/
16
https://swachhindia.ndtv.com/23-million-women-drop-out-of-school-every-year-when-they-start-menstruating-in-i
ndia-17838/
17
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/india-sees-88-rape-cases-a-day-but-conviction-rate-below-30/articleshow
/78526440.cms
 NEERAJ 8

(a) Quantitative: Have female-centric questions in the zero hour increased/decreased over the years?
(b) Quantitative: How have female parliamentarians contributed to these questions?
(c) Qualitative: What kind of themes on women’s issues have been covered over the years?

The data on each question presented by parliamentarians across the listed terms has been provided by the
Parliamentary Questions Portal by the Trivedi Centre for Political Data (Ashoka University). All data is
originally from Lok Sabha's Website and has been cleaned and treated in-house by adding information
about the Lok Sabha MPs (constituency names, states, gender etc.) from the data shared by the Election
Commission of India in the Statistical Reports18.

After conclusively determining that female representation and discussions around female issues are
qualitatively and quantitatively in need for improvement, the paper will move into discussing
implications, recommendations, and global best practices to rectify this.

3.1 Why Zero Hour Discussions?

The Indian Parliament has several mechanisms in place to ensure that office-holders remain accountable
to the people through questioning the relevant ministries on a myriad of topics-- these include the
question hour and the zero hour. The former is the liveliest hour in Parliament. It is during this one hour
that Members of Parliament ask questions of ministers and hold them accountable for the functioning of
their ministries. The latter is an unregulated practice that has emerged over the decades through practicing
parliamentarians instead of codification in the rules of procedure, making it an Indian parliamentary
innovation. The concept of Zero Hour started organically in the first decade of Indian Parliament, when
MPs felt the need for raising important constituency and national issues.

During the initial days, Parliament used to break for lunch at 1 pm. Therefore, the opportunity for MPs to
raise national issues without an advance notice became available at 12 pm and could last for an hour
until the House adjourned for lunch. This led to the hour being popularly referred to as Zero Hour and
the issues being raised during this time as Zero Hour submissions. Over the years, presiding officers of
both Houses have given directions to streamline the working of Zero Hour to make it even more effective.
Its importance can be gauged from the support it receives from citizens, media, MPs and presiding
officers despite not being part of the rulebook19.
18
https://qh.lokdhaba.ashoka.edu.in/about
19
https://www.prsindia.org/media/articles-by-prs-team/expert-explains-what-are-question-hour-and-zero-hour-and-w
hy-they-matter
 NEERAJ 9

Given the importance of this segment of the session, it is essential that we examine the substantial nature
of the questions being raised therein. Specifically, look into how female-centric questions have emerged
during the zero hour over the years.

4. Findings
After analysing the zero hour questions related to female issues, it was established that there has been a
marked increase in such discussions with each term and most yearly breakups suggest a markup as well.
The following show the yearly breakup of female-centric themes being brought up during the zero hour.

Year No of Questions Year No of Questions

Lok Sabha Term 13 (2000-2003) Lok Sabha Term 14 (2004-2008)

2000 607 2004 344

2001 546 2005 662

2002 596 2006 555

2003 493 2007 625

2008 538

Lok Sabha Term 15 (2009-2013) Lok Sabha Term 16 (2014-2018)

2009 509 2014 721

2010 922 2015 1123

2011 838 2016 1200

2012 1086 2017 1045

2013 1064 2018 1628

Please note that in the event that the year preceding the mentioned years saw smaller question outputs (as
can be the case when the sessions seep into the next year), the remaining questions have been susmused
by the following year to ensure that the net output of the term remains true to data.

As evidenced by the data, the number of female-centred questions have increased exponentially
from 2000 to 2018, showing an increase of 168% in 18 years.
 NEERAJ 10

While 2004 recorded the lowest number of such questions at 344, the highest was recorded in 2018
at 1628, suggesting an upward trajectory.

The yearly average per term was 560 in term 13, 544 in term 14, 883 in term 15 and 1143 in term
16. With the exception of the slight drop from term 13 to term 14, the yearly averages have
increased exponentially from term 13 to term 16.

The yearly average decreased by 2.8% from term 13 to term 14. There was an increase of 68.5%
from term 14 to term 15 and 29.4% from term 15 to term 16.
 NEERAJ 11

The above is a year-wise breakup of the questions asked in each Lok Sabha term starting from Term 13 in
2000 and ending with Term 16 in 2018.

The year-wise breakup along with the total questions mapped above show a clear increase in the questions
being asked related to women’s issues.

The tally of such questions being asked was as follows;

Term 13: 2242, Term 14: 2714, Term 15: 4422, Term 16: 5717

However, to ensure that this increase was not merely due to the total questions asked in the zero hours
increasing as a whole (and not such women’s issues), it is imperative to look at the proportion of
questions.

Upon looking at the proportion of the female centric questions compared to the total questions asked in
the terms, the following was revealed.

Term 13: 3.04% questions out of the total 73531 were concerned with women-centric themes.
Term 14: 4% questions of the total 66371 were concerned with women-centric themes.
Term 15: 5.5% questions of the total 79401 were concerned with women-centric themes.
Term 16: 7.2% questions of the total 78989 were concerned with women-centric themes.
 NEERAJ 12

The paper notes that albeit slowly, the number of women in the lower house of the parliament has shown
marginal increases. As more and more female candidates are endorsed with parties and gender equality
becomes a major concern for campaign manifestos and policy programmes, discussions on bridging this
gap have been increasing in the lok sabha. However, it is important that we understand the impact of an
increasing number of female parliamentarians on this-- does the existence of more women MPs
necessarily translate to them voicing women’s issues? The next section attempts to answer this.

According to our data findings,

Term 13: 12.44% of the questions on gender equality were asked by women MPs (9.9% of the total MPs)
Term 14: 12.15% of the questions on gender equality were asked by women MPs (9.5% of the total MPs)
Term 15: 20.3% of the questions on gender equality were asked by women MPs (11.4% of the total MPs)
Term 16: 22.3% of the questions on gender equality were asked by women MPs (12.1% of the total MPs)
 NEERAJ 13

Year No of Questions by Female MPs Year No of Questions by Female MPs

Lok Sabha Term 13 (2000-2003) Lok Sabha Term 14 (2004-2008)

2000 81 2004 43

2001 65 2005 80

2002 75 2006 55

2003 58 2007 67

2008 85

Lok Sabha Term 15 (2009-2013) Lok Sabha Term 16 (2014-2018)

2009 90 2014 150

2010 171 2015 292

2011 187 2016 216

2012 245 2017 208

2013 205 2018 410

At face value, the contribution of female parliamentarians appears low because of the frequencies
recorded here, however once we put this in the framework of the number of women MPs, the
results appear more favourable. In term 13, 12.44% of the female-centric questions were asked by
women when they only constituted 9.9% of the total house. Similarly, term 14, term 15 and term 16
witnessed 12.15%, 20.3%, and 22.3% of the questions on gender equality being asked by women
when they only occupied 9.5%, 11.4% and 12.1% of the house respectively.
Thus we see that women have increasing contributions, and it has always more than their average share
in the house. A strong case can be made for getting more women in the house.

According to findings, the number of female-centred questions asked by female MPs have increased
manifold from 2000 to 2018, showing an increase of 406% in 18 years. This is all the more
remarkable when we realise that the number of female MPs in the lower house has only increased
by 22.2% in the same period.

While 2004 recorded the lowest number of such questions at 43, the highest was recorded in 2018 at
410 suggesting an upward trajectory.
 NEERAJ 14

The yearly average per term was 69.75 in term 13, 66 in term 14, 179.6 in term 15 and 255.2 in term
16. With the exception of the slight drop from term 13 to term 14, the yearly averages have
increased exponentially from term 13 to term 16.

The yearly average decreased by 5.37% from term 13 to term 14. There was an increase of 171.2%
from term 14 to term 15 and 42% from term 15 to term 16.
 NEERAJ 15

Now that we have established that both, the number of questions on gender equality and the proportion of
them being asked by female parliamentarians has been increasing steadily from 2000 to 2018, the next
section will attempt to dissect what these questions were about. We will primarily look at the ministries
these were directed towards (zero hour questions are directed towards concerned ministries) to see which
domains within gender equality (ranging from healthcare, education, employment etc) have found the
most mention and remained a priority during zero hour discussions. The paper will then briefly expand
upon some of the most recurring themes according to the dataset.

4.1 Question Themes

We look at the ministries that the zero hour questions were addressed to in order to get a sense of the
themes they touch upon. Each human-interest domain in India has been assigned a dedicated ministry to
enable policy programs and respond to arising issues in said domains-- for example, healthcare is dealt
with by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, education by the Ministry of Human Resources
Development. By seeing which ministry the female-centric zero hour questions were addressed to, we can
see what themes have been in discussion over the years.

The table below is a tally of all the questions on gender equity being directed to various ministries from
2000-2018.
 NEERAJ 16

Ministry Session 13 Session 14 Session 15 Session 16

Women and Child Development NA* 461 1222 1247

Human Resource Development 528 449 437 565

Health and Family Welfare 267 297 469 459

Social Justice and Empowerment 198 96 101 142

Home Affairs 134 202 423 419

Rural Development 127 71 152 191

Agriculture 147 141 65 88

Labour 98 78 138 187

Tribal Affairs 78 97 114 238

Youth Affairs and Sports 72 91 144 220

Finance 58 51 78 172

Law and Justice 76 52 89 159

Panchyati Raj 56 42 69

Information and Broadcasting 48 33 70 66

Agro and Rural Industries 47 47 21

Planning 45 41 47 39

Science and Technology 36 45 34 125

Skill Development and Entrepreneurship 134

Overseas Indian Affairs 36 58

Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation 36 16 15

External Affairs 30 25 22 76

Textiles 23 24 25 36

Minority Affairs 19 91 168

Corporate Affairs 21 6 28

Environment and Forest 15 8 16

Non-Conventional Energy Sources 21 20 10 11

Micro Small and Medium Enterprises 20 50 88 97

 NEERAJ 17

Railways 18 49 68 105

Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation 23 34 16

Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions 15 8 30 24

Civil Aviation 13 8 10 14

Commerce and Industry 13 9 12 20

Defence 13 31 39 59

Water Resources 12 25 56 112

Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution 5 32 95 71

Coal and Mines 4 12 14 35

Development of North Eastern Regions 4 4 3 7

Chemicals and Fertilisers 3 2 6

Electronics Information Technology 5 11 12 83

Power 3 2 8 5

Road Transport and Highways 3 1 4 23

Space 3 2 3

Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises 2 9 11

Statistics and Programme Implementation 2 2 4 6

Steel 2 2

Tourism 2 7 16 36

Urban Employment and Poverty Alleviation 2

Culture 1 4 6

Food Processing Industries 1 5 19 7

Petroleum and and Natural Gas 16 23 48

Parliamentary Affairs 1

Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy 13

* Ministry created after session 13.

* The highlighted cells mark the most frequently mentioned ministries.
 NEERAJ 18

From the above tally, the following ministries and their subsequent domains have emerged as the most
frequently mentioned female-centric themes during zero hour sessions;

1) Ministry of Women and Child Development

Apex body for formulation and administration of the rules and regulations and laws relating to women and
child development in India.

2) Ministry of Human Resource Development

Responsible for policy decisions for education and skill development in the country

3) Ministry of Health and Family Welfare

Ministry charged with health policy in India. It is also responsible for all government programs relating to
family planning in India

4) Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment

Responsible for welfare, social justice and empowerment of disadvantaged and marginalised sections of
society

5) Ministry of Home Affairs

Ministry mainly responsible for the maintenance of internal security and domestic policy

6) Ministry of Rural Development

Body entrusted with the task of accelerating the socio-economic development of rural India. Its focus is on
health, education, drinking water, housing and roads.

7) Ministry of Agriculture
Apex body for formulation and administration of the rules and regulations and laws related to agriculture in
India.

8) Ministry of Labour
Responsible for the protection and safeguard the interests of workers in general and those who constitute the
poor, deprived and disadvantaged sections wrt employment

9) Ministry of Tribal Affairs

The ministry looks after the affairs of the tribal communities in India

10) Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports

The body administers the department of youth affairs and the department of sports in India.

While these ministries have been the most mentioned, there have been some internal variations with
respect to their domains being discussed every term for gender equality questions.

The below graph maps this variation by showing the changes per term, per ministry (most mentioned as
listed above).
 NEERAJ 19

Key Observations:

1) The Ministry of Women and Child Development was created in 2006, around the 14th Term of the Lok
Sabha. The findings reveal that ever since its creation, the majority of the questions related to
female-centric issues have been directed to the MWCD with term 14 witnessing 461 questions, term 15
having 1222 and term 16 recording 1246 questions.

Not only do we find more questions being directed to the MWCD, it is also suggested that ever since a
dedicated ministry was established for overseeing the development of women, questions around such
themes have increased. In the 15th term, questions to the ministry encompassed 27.6% of the total
questions on female themes and they constituted 22% of such mentions in the 16th term.
 NEERAJ 20

2) The data suggests that the while the core ministries and domains finding the most mention have
remained more or less consistent (women and child development, human resource development, health
and family welfare, social justice and empowerment, home affairs, rural development, agriculture, labour,
tribal affairs, sports and youth), there are have been some variations in their priority levels with each
changing session.

Term No. Rank 1 Rank 2 Rank 3 Rank 4 Rank 5 Rank 6 Rank 7 Rank 8 Rank 9 Rank 10

Term 13 Human Health and Social Justice Agriculture Home Affairs Rural Labour Tribal Youth Affairs Finance
Resource Family and Development Affairs and Sports
Development Welfare Empowerment

Term 14 Women and Human Health and Home Agriculture Social Justice Tribal Youth Labour Rural
Child Resource Family Affairs and Affairs Affairs and Development
Development Development Welfare Empowerment Sports

Term 15 Women and Health and Human Home Rural Labour Youth Tribal Social Justice Consumer
Child Family Resource Affairs Development Affairs Affairs and Affairs and
Development Welfare Development and Sports Empowerment Public
Distribution

Term 16 Women and Human Health and Home Tribal Affairs Youth Affairs Rural Labour Finance Minority
Child Resource Family Affairs and Sports Developm Affairs
Development Development Welfare ent

3) As seen in the table above, ‘Social Justice and Empowerment’ have gone down in frequencies of
mentions-- from the third most mentioned ministry wrt gender equality, the ministry fell down rank 6
during session 14, rank 9 during session 15 and off the list in session 19. This could be indicative of the
emergence of novel bodies like the WCD Ministry taking precedence in female issues.

4) The three most mentioned domains during zero hour questions have been education (ministry of HRD),
healthcare (ministry of HFW) and the dedicated women's ministry (WCD). In recent years, home affairs
has also emerged as an integral issue, ranking at the fourth position-- this comes in the context of
increasing crimes against women that are addressed by this department.

5) The Department of Youth Affairs and Sports has been emerging over the years (increased from rank 9
in term 13 to rank 8 in term 14, rank 7 in term 15 and rank 6 in term 16) with an increased focus on
investing in female youth and athletes.
 NEERAJ 21

6) The ministries of Rural Development and Tribal Affairs have been turbulent in terms of their
frequencies of mention over the years, but the later terms (15, 16) are showing signs of renewed
importance. There have been certain outliers like minority affairs and consumer affairs have found
substantial mentions in recent years.

While these are the most mentioned domains, there are certain other upcoming themes that are worth
mentioning in this report;

1) There has been increased interest in promoting skill development within female communities. Zero
hour questions have focused on the impact of policies like National Policy on Skill Development on
women-- “what is the number of educated, uneducated, skilled, semi-skilled, unskilled, self-employed,
employed and unemployed women at present in urban and rural areas of the country” (MP Ganesh Singh,
2014), “whether the Government has any proposal to open Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) exclusively
for women in the country” (MP Mausam Noor, 2016).

2) Several questions have specifically focused on increasing digital literacy for women over the years.
They recognise the importance of teaching women computer skills in today’s economy, beyond just the
bare minimum levels of education--“whether the National Commission for Women (NCW) is undertaking
a digital literacy programme in the country” (MP BB Patil, 2019).

3) Even in discussions of female safety, there has been enhanced conversations around cyber harassments
and calls for policy measures to curb online attacks to women’s security-- “the status of the
implementation of the Cyber Crime Prevention against Women and Children (CCPWC) Scheme in the
country along with its salient feature” (MP Rahul Shewale, 2018).

4) Creating dedicated infrastructure to promote women in sports has also become an upcoming theme
during zero hour discussions. Questions have focused on inquiring whether equipment, training, scouting
opportunities are being made available to girl athletes in the country-- “whether the Government proposes
to formulate a separate scheme for promoting sports for girl students in view of their increasing
participation and good results thereof in sports” (MP Nihalchand, 2018).

5) In addition to discussions on maternal mortality, reproductive care and fertility, there is a growing
interest in promoting menstrual hygeine and abortion facilities for women-- “ whether the Government is
 NEERAJ 22

implementing any scheme for promotion of menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls primarily in rural
areas” (MP Shobha Karandlaje, 2018). Another novel theme emerging pertains to promoting mental
health awareness amongst adolescents.--- “whether the Government provides mental healthcare facilities
to the poorest sections of the society in rural areas'' (MP Rajaiah Siricilla)

6. Recently, promoting innovation and entrepreneurship (including start-ups) amongst women has also
occupied zero hour questions with inputs focusing on increasinging investment opportunities and ease of
doing business policies for female owned businesses-- “whether the Government proposes to establish a
network to create business model for the various products and services to empower women and to
increase their entrepreneurship skill in Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) sector” (MP
Khadse Raksha Nikhil, 2018), “whether the Stand-Up India Scheme has been launched by the
Government to facilitate bank loans to Woman entrepreneurs across the country” (MP Hema Malini,
2018).

6. Various concerns of women across minority communities including SC, ST and religious minorities
like muslims have also been voiced during zero hour discussions-- “whether the Government is taking
steps to ensure participation of Muslim women in the development process” (MP Raju Shetty, 2017), “
whether the Ministry has any proposal to open some Skill Development Centres for Minority Girls in the
entire country” (MP Santosh Kumar, 2018), “whether the Government has launched any scheme for
Leadership Development of Minority Women” (MP Sunil Gaikwad, 2018).

7. Given the reservation for women in the panchayati raj system, their representation in local governance
bodies has also emerged as a key topic of debate. Questions have focused on the effectiveness of the
reservation, training of female sarpanchs and allocation of funds to name a few-- “ whether the
Government has launched an intensive training programme for the Elected Women Representatives
(EWRs) of Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs)” (MP Joice George, 2017), “whether complaints have been
received regarding unnecessary interference by the husbands in the duties of women public
representatives of Panchayat” (MP Bhairon Prasad).

While it is difficult to conclusively claim that these novel discussions have directly caused policy
changes, it is safe to assume that voicing these issues during zero hour discussions has shed light on
several challenges faced by women in this country. Such amplification has been reflected in some key
programmes focused on alleviating obstacles to gender equality. Some examples include;
 NEERAJ 23

1. The Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Skill India Mission and National Skill
Development Corporation (NSDC) have been working to empower women in the workforce. For
instance, Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojan strives to promote increased participation of women in the
workforce through appropriate skilling and gender mainstreaming of skills. Close to 50% of the
candidates enrolled and trained under PMKVY are women; out of the total 56 lakh candidates who have
benefited from the scheme20. Further, NSDC through its training partners is working exclusively on skill
development of women, especially in rural areas. The training constitutes imparting digital, accounting
and entrepreneurial skills so as to facilitate the possibility of setting up their own business21.

2. In 2018, the National Commission for Women launched The "Digital Literacy and Online Safety
Programme" that aims to train 60,000 women in universities across major cities of India regarding safe
use of internet, social media and email that will enable them to differentiate between the credible and
questionable information available online22.

3. The Cyber Crime Prevention against Women and Children (CCPWC) was launched in 2019 with a
budget of INR 223cr. It’s objective is to have an effective mechanism to handle cyber crimes against
women and children in the country and implement an online cybercrime reporting platform, national level
cyber forensic laboratory, training of personnel and introducing cyber crime awareness activities23.

4. The Khelo India Scheme has a dedicated ‘Sports for Women’ division that aims to promote female
sportspersons. The unit seeks to encourage the participation of women especially in male-dominated
sports, funding for holding competitions and talent scouting and support participants with training and
infrastructural support24.

5. The Government of India has launched several policies and schemes to elevate female entrepreneurs in
the country through Stand-Up India, NITI Ayog and the Ministry of MSMEs to name a few. These
include investment and incubation opportunities, launching challenges to promote women in business and
implementing training programs. For instance, the ‘TREAD’ scheme launched by the Ministry of MSMEs
grants meritorious female entrepreneurs funding of up to 30% for their project cost25.

20
https://www.nationalskillsnetwork.in/skill-india-women-initiatives/
21
Ibid.
22
http://ncw.nic.in/basic-page/digital-literacy-and-online-safety-programme
23
https://pib.gov.in/Pressreleaseshare.aspx?PRID=1559115
24
https://yas.nic.in/sites/default/files/Khelo%20India%20-%20Sports%20For%20Women.pdf
25
https://www.standupmitra.in/Home/SubsidySchemesForWomen
 NEERAJ 24

As revealed by the data, the case of female representation across parliaments is grim and requires urgent
attention. To that effect, several policy programs to boost these numbers have been launched globally as
well as in India. The next section gives a brief overview of such measures.

5. Promoting Women in Parliaments: Policy Measures

Reservations
While the 73rd Amendment allowed for female reservations in local governance bodies, the Women’s
Reservation Bill (2010) that seeks one third reservations in the Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies
has been tabled in the parliament for decades. Opponents argue on several fronts including that it would
perpetuate the unequal status of women since they would not be perceived to be competing on merit and
restrict voter choice. However, reservations have been used globally to promote high numbers of female
parliamentarians. For instance, Bolivia constructed an electoral law in which they made it compulsory to
have 50% of female candidates on every political party list. Similarly, Argentina was the first country to
adopt the world’s first gender quota law in 1991, mandating every political party to nominate 30% of its
electable position on their candidate lists as women26.

Alternatives to reservations have been suggested by some experts including reservation for candidates
within political parties. This is argued to provide more democratic choice to voters, and enable more
flexibility to parties to choose candidates and constituencies depending on local political and social
factors. However, on the flipside, the election of women to the parliament cannot be guaranteed by this
measure but only made more plausible27. ƒ

Dedicated Standing Committees

Beyond simply promoting more MPs in the Lok Sabha, the parliament can voice gendered issues
effectively through dedicated parliamentary committees focused on gender equality. A strength of all
parliamentary committees dealing with gender equality is that they are all permanent committees of their
respective parliaments. That is, each of these parliaments has chosen to dedicate resources to the issue of
gender equality rather than appoint a select or ad hoc committee to deal with issues on an as needed basis.
Examples of dedicated gender equality committees include the Belgian Advisory Committee on Equal
Opportunities for Men and Women, the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on the Status
of Women, the Indian Committee on the Empowerment of Women, and the Task Forces on the Rights of

26
https://www.ndi.org/sites/default/files/1852_bo_propoor_100104.pdf
27
https://prsindia.org/billtrack/womens-reservation-bill-the-constitution-108th-amendment-bill-2008-45
 NEERAJ 25

Women and Equal Opportunities for Men and Women in both the French Senate and the National
Assembly. These are permanent bodies of their parliaments, constituted under internal rules, with
membership reflecting the representation of political parties (or parliamentary party groups) in the
parliament. While India already has a dedicated standing committee, “Indian Committee on the
Empowerment of Women”, their recommendations ought to be taken seriously in order for the committee
deliberations to result in policy changes.

Gender-Sensitive Research Support

Parliamentary research services that allow for a gender-sensitive analysis and support to MPs could also
increase the quality of female representation. These services provide support to legislators by
coordinating and promoting gender training and awareness-raising in legislative work; providing expert
advice on gender to all technical-administrative legislative entities in the legislative process; and creating
strategies for communication and coordination with civil society and organisations that facilitate public
participation in discussions around female-equality in the parliament. Some global examples of this
include The German Bundestag that has established formal links with the dedicated unit on gender
equality at the Humboldt University of Berlin, ensuring access to quality gender analysis for
parliamentarians and staff. The Australian Parliament provides a range of gender-sensitive research
services, on request, to Members of Parliament from its Parliamentary Library.

6. Conclusion
The paper has demonstrated that there is a clear crisis of female representation in the Indian parliament
with women occupying 12% of the seats while they constitute nearly 48% of the entire population. There
is an urgent need to rectify this situation through prioritising women candidates in party lists, giving
serious considerations to a reservation system within the house, sensitising and training future women
leaders and making discussions within the parliament gender-sensitive. The dataset collection process
made it evident that while a myriad of female-centric issues have found mention during zero hour
discussions-- from healthcare to safety, there is still very little emphasis on demanding increased
representation of women in leadership positions beyond just the panchayati raj system.

However, having said that, the paper is also testimony to the fact that albeit slowly, the influence of
women parliamentarians and the mention of issues of gender equality have been enhanced over the years.
Not only did we witness a numeric increase in focus on female-issues, the range of issues being discussed
has expanded dramatically and now covers upcoming themes including mental health, female-owned
businesses, digital literacy and skill development to name a few. The global trend of equal gender rights
 NEERAJ 26

has evidently reached the lower house of the Indian Parliament. This proves the political appetite for
making the parliament more accessible to women through a rethinking of policy programs around
enhanced female representation at the highest level of governance.