The tradition of Nagaland keeping women out of politics must end. Doors must be opened for gender equality, both within the home and in society
This Women’s Day, it will be apt to reflect on why one of the top 10 States of India to record high female literacy rate, is also the only one that has virtually no women in public life. Indeed, Nagaland is the only State that has never had a woman legislator in its 55-year old political history.
Since its inception in 1963, Nagaland has seen only one woman politician rise to power, Rano M Shaiza of the United Democratic Party, who was elected to the lok Sabha in 1977; she also became the first woman president of a Naga political party. Ironically, however, Shaiza failed to replicate her own feat at the State level, ending up forfeiting her deposit when she subsequently fought State elections in 1982.
The recently concluded Assembly election in the State offered hope of bringing a modicum of gender equity in Nagaland’s political circles when, for the first time in its electoral history, as many as five women candidates were in the fray among the 196 contestants. These included Wedie-u Kronu and Mangyangpula Chang from the National People’s Party — Awan Konyak from the National Democratic Progressive Party, Rhakila from the BJP and Independent candidate Rekha Rose Dukru.
Among these, only Konyak, losing by just 905 votes to her rival from the Naga People’s Front, made her presence felt but she failed to penetrate the male bastion of Naga politics.
The political exclusion of Naga women is a complete antithesis of their educational and professional empowerment. Female literacy rates in the State rose significantly to 76.69 per cent in the 2011 Census from 61.46 per cent in 2001. Women also have high enrolment rates in education and are well represented in Government jobs in the State.
Further, 25 per cent of the seats in village development boards are reserved for women. Then, what prevents them from attaining political powerIJ According to Abeiu Meru, president of the Naga Mothers’ Association, Naga tradition fiercely advocates limiting women’s role to nurturing the family, which even highly-educated women, with a calibre exceeding that of most men, find difficult to break.
Meru’s party led a prolonged legal battle to enable more women to contest elections in the State, following which the State Government announced 33 per cent reservation for women in urban local body (UlB) polls in February 2017.
However, this move led to violent retaliation by many Naga tribal groups, citing Article 371(A) of the Constitution, which accords special provisions to Nagaland, stipulating that “no Act of Parliament shall apply to Nagaland in relation to religious or social practices of the Nagas, Naga customary law and procedure, … and ownership and transfer of land…”.
The State Government was eventually forced to declare the UlB polls null and void to quell the violence, requesting the Centre to exempt Nagaland from reserving seats for women in the Municipal polls.
Chuba Ozukum, president of tribal body Naga Hoho, that opposes women’s reservation, admits that Naga women are competent to succeed in politics and as policymakers, can help reduce corruption in the State, but insists that customary law confining women to the home cannot be bypassed even today.
All political parties try to brush the issue under the carpet with their Pharisee-like explanations. Says Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee spokesperson GK Zhimomi, “When no women come forward to seek tickets, it is unfair to ask why political parties don’t issue them to women.”
Ozukum went further asserting that Nagaland has always had the costliest and most corrupt elections in the country, which is why women with ‘clean images’ are neither morally nor financially prepared to take the plunge into the murky political waters of the State.
Gender inequality is, in fact, manifested in every aspect of public life in Nagaland despite the prevalent belief that Naga society is matrilineal and more liberal than any other part of the country. This belief is debunked by Monisha Behal, chairperson of North-East Network, which undertook a comprehensive study of the status of women in Nagaland in 2016. Behal contends that Naga women have neither inheritance rights over property nor decision-making powers within their home, community, over landed resources, over marriage, and over reproductive health.
The effect of a gendered socialisation is, thus, obviously impacting politics in Nagaland. The time is perhaps ripe to demolish the structural and institutional barriers constraining women’s political participation in the State, and open the doors for gender equality within both Naga homes and society.
(The writer is Editor at the National Council of Applied Economic Research. Views expressed here are personal)
