SC issues notice to the Centre seeking its response in a plea to implement the Women’s Reservation Bill before the 2024 elections

On December 12, 2023, a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court (SC) issued a notice to the Centre seeking a response regarding the implementation of the Women’s Reservation Bill. The petition was filed by Dr. Jaya Thakur who sought directions from the SC to the Centre to implement the recently enacted law that provides 33% reservation for women in Parliament and State Legislative Assemblies before the 2024 general elections. The matter was heard by Justice SVN Bhatti and Justice Sanjiv Khanna. During the hearing, Justice Khanna observed, “We will be virtually legislating then (if we allow the prayers)...It will be very difficult for us to do that. This is a good step taken...There are a lot of issues (in the petition). Seats will have to be reserved first, quotas are always fixed on that basis. This is implemented by the rules.” The plea filed also sought the declaration of words in Article 34A “after an exercise of delimitation is undertaken for this purpose after the relevant figures for the first census,” as void ab initio. It also stated that the implementation of the Constitution (One Hundred and Sixth Amendment) Act, 2023, should be done immediately without waiting for the delimitation exercise or the conduct of a census.