Dhaka,. Women’s participation in politics is ending in Bangladesh. There are two names recorded on the pages of political history of Bangladesh, who gave a new direction to the country. The history of Bangladesh politics is incomplete without the names of Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina. Despite this, today women’s participation is ending here. The number of women candidates in the elections to be held on February 12 this year in Bangladesh is negligible.
According to media reports, promises to increase women’s participation and empower them have been made for decades, but still a different picture of their role is visible in the upcoming elections. According to Bangladeshi media, more than 30 registered political parties including Jamaat-e-Islami have not fielded any female candidate. The number of women among all the candidates in the 13th parliamentary elections is less than 4.5 percent. This figure is very worrying.
Out of 2,568 nominations submitted for the elections, only 109 women have filed their nominations. According to the data, out of 2,568 nominations, the number of women is only 4.24 percent. A report states that out of 51 political parties participating in the upcoming general elections, 30 have not nominated even a single woman candidate. Many women candidates lost their candidature during scrutiny. Of the 37 independent women candidates, nominations of only six were declared valid.
According to the report, 276 candidates are from Jamaat-e-Islami, 268 from Islami Andolan Bangladesh, 224 from Jatiya Party, 104 from Gana Adhikar Parishad, 94 from Bangladesh Khilafat Majlis, and other smaller parties, each having less than 40 candidates, but there is no woman candidate. Social Resistance Committee, a platform of 71 organizations working on women, human rights and development issues, has expressed concern over the low number of women candidates in the upcoming elections, saying that given the misogynistic culture present in the society, women are hesitant to contest elections as independent candidates. The reason for low participation of women in politics is the reflection of male-dominated political culture there and the policy of maintaining the ideology of male-dominated politics and male-dominated society.
