Hyderabad: Out of 119 seats in the state, women voters hold the key in 58. These constituencies have more women voters than male. Unfortunately, political parties have fielded an overwhelming number of male candidates from these seats.
The Congress and the BJP have fielded men in the 50 women-dominated constituencies, and the TRS 56. Political parties speak of giving 33 per cent reservations to women in Parliament and Legislative Assemblies but in practice they don’t field women candidates.
The Congress and the BJP have fielded eight women candidates each in these constituencies, and the TRS two. In Yellendu, both the Congress and BJP candidates are women.
Of the 18 women candidates in the fray, five were members of the recently dissolved House — Badige Shoba (Choppadandi), Padma Devendar Reddy (Medak), Konda Surekha (Parakala) of the TRS and the Congress’ D.K. Aruna (Gadwal) and N. Padmavathi Reddy (Kodada).
Among them, the TRS denied tickets to two leaders — Ms Shobha who joined the BJP and Ms Surekha who moved to the Congress.
Eight women candidates fielded from these seats are contesting for the first time — from the BJP Telugu actress Reshma (Wyra), A. Swarna Reddy (Nirmal), P. Ramadevi (Mudhole) Uppala Sarada (Khammam) and Nagasravanthi (Yellendu) from the Congress Haripriya (Yellendu) and G. Sujatha (Adilabad) and the TRS’ Azmeera Rekha (Khanapur).The others are fomer MLAs: Dasari Anasuya alias Seethakka (Mulugu), Sunitha Laxma Reddy (Narsapur) Akula Lalitha (Armoor) of the Congress, and from the BJP, ex-Congress legislators Arunatara (Jukkal) and Kunja Satyavathi (Bhadrachalam).
