Women: The real losers in Northeast polls as representation declines

While the national-ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has made unprecedented electoral gains in India’s northeast after assembly elections in Meghalaya, Tripura and Nagaland, women’s representation remains below India’s average and has declined further in Meghalaya and Tripura, according to an IndiaSpend analysis of electoral data.

Barely 3 per cent, or six of 180 seats, across the three state assemblies (60 seats for each state) have gone to women–three each in Meghalaya and Tripura and none in Nagaland, show election data in this March 2018 report by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), a non-partisan advocacy.

This is a third of the national average of women representatives in state assemblies (9 per cent), and a quarter of women’s representation in Parliament (12 per cent), as IndiaSpend reported on March 8, 2016. Globally, India ranks 148 among 193 member-nations of the UN for women’s representation in parliamen

Northeast poll results: Yechury accuses BJP of using money, muscle power

Accepting the Tripura mandate, Communist Party of India (Marxist) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury on Saturday charged the BJP with using money and muscle power to win the state assembly elections.

"This has happened because the BJP has unscrupulously utilised huge amounts of money power and muscle power and managed to successfully bring together all anti-Left elements and parties including, the erstwhile opposition parties together into one anti-Left platform. They succeeded as a result of that," he said as the election results came in.

Yechury warned the people of Tripura that there would be unfavourable ramifications due to the use of money in elections. "BJP brought together all kinds of forces using money power without attaching any morality to it. There will be results due to this for which people need to be alert," he said.