No Women’s Quota: BJP-Congress Fields 11% Women in Elections, Overall Participation Just 10% After Women’s Reservation Bill Passed in 2023

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EVEN AFTER the passage of the women's reservation bill in 2023, India's two biggest national parties have failed to come close to the 33% benchmark for women candidates in elections. A new report by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW) has revealed that both the BJP and Congress fielded around 11% women candidates across Assembly elections held after the bill, also known as Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, was passed.

The report analysed 39,789 candidates who contested the 2024 Lok Sabha election and 20 State and Union Territory Assembly elections conducted after Parliament passed the Women's Reservation Bill. According to the findings, the BJP fielded only 217 women out of 1,964 candidates in the 20 Assembly elections, amounting to 11.04%. The Congress stood at the same rate, giving tickets to 229 women out of 1,935 candidates, amounting 11.83%.

The Women's Reservation Bill seeks to reserve one-third of seats in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies for women. However, the law has not yet been implemented because it remains linked to the ongoing census and the eventual delimitation process, originally estimated to be established till 2034 elections.

The ADR report found that the BJP did not meet the 33% benchmark in any of the 21 elections examined. On the other hand, Congress managed to cross the mark only once, during the 2024 Sikkim Assembly election, where it fielded 33% women candidates. In the 2024 Lok Sabha election, women made up 16% of BJP candidates and 13% of Congress candidates.

Women Missing From Hundreds Of Constituencies

The ADR-NEW report paints a grim picture of women representation across different elections. Out of the 39,789 candidates, only 4,073 were women, accounting for just 10.2% of the total.

The Lok Sabha election also saw large areas where no women candidates were fielded. Out of 543 parliamentary constituencies, 152 constituencies, around 28%, did not have a single woman representative contesting.

See Also: PM Narendra Modi Backs Women’s Reservation and Delimitation Bills in Parliament, Assures No Discrimination will Happen

Among Assembly polls, the BJP's highest share of women candidates came in Jharkhand, where women accounted for 18% of its nominees. However, at the same time, the party did not field any woman candidate in Andhra Pradesh and Puducherry elections.

For Congress, the lowest representation was recorded in Jammu and Kashmir, where only one woman was among its 39 candidates. The lowest overall proportion of women candidates among all parties was recorded in Arunachal Pradesh and J&K Assembly elections, both held in 2024. In both the elections women constituted around 5% of total candidates. The highest share was seen in Delhi (2025), Odisha (2024) and Puducherry (2026), where women made up almost 14% of representatives.

BJP’s Delimitation Push for 2029 Elections Fails

While national parties struggled, several regional parties recorded significantly higher participation by women.

In the 2024 Lok Sabha election, Naam Tamilar Katchi fielded 50% women candidates, while the Biju Janata Dal fielded 33%. Rashtriya Janata Dal gave 29% of its tickets to women and the Trinamool Congress allotted 25%.

The trend continued in Assembly elections. Naam Tamilar Katchi fielded 50% women candidates in both Tamil Nadu and Puducherry. CPI(ML)(Liberation) fielded 56% women candidates in West Bengal and 33% in Assam. The report also highlighted that the Samajwadi Party allotted 40% of its tickets to women in Rajasthan.

The report comes amid renewed debate over women's reservation after the Modi government recently attempted to fast-track the 2023 law through the Delimitation Bill 2026 and a Constitutional Amendment Bill. While the opposition parties also stand in favor of the immediate implementation of the reservation bill, they demand that it should be done without linking it to delimitation.

The Constitutional Amendment Bill was ultimately rejected in Parliament, forcing the government to withdraw the accompanying delimitation bill as well. The ADR-NEW report now adds fresh fuel to the debate over whether political parties are really practising gender equality that they preach.

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