Seeking to corner the Congress on the issue of women empowerment, the government on Tuesday, 17 July, urged the main opposition party to join hands to pass the bills on women's reservation, triple talaq and nikah halala in Parliament, reported PTI.
Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad wrote a letter to Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday, suggesting that his party and the BJP join hands to get the three bills, as well as the measure on providing constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes, passed in Parliament.
“This bill (Women’s Empowerment Bill) should be passed along with anti-triple talaq and nikah halala bills,” Prasad wrote.
He was responding to a letter by Gandhi to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to bring the bill on granting 33 percent reservation to women in Lok Sabha and state assemblies.
In the letter, Prasad also took digs at the previous UPA government. He asked “why the Women’s Reservation Bill was not taken up for three years by the UPA government in the Lok Sabha and allowed to lapse”.
Prasad wrote to Gandhi as his ministry deals with the issues of reservation in legislatures and personal laws.
On Monday, Gandhi had written to Modi asking him to ensure the passage of the Women's Reservation Bill in the monsoon session of Parliament, which commences on 18 July and ends on 10 August.
In his letter, Gandhi offered his party's “unconditional support” to the bill and said the time has come for a change, and for women to take their rightful place in state legislatures and in Parliament.
(With inputs from PTI and ANI.)
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