India’s first women-only party launched with aim to fight for reservation in Parliament, against workplace harassment

New Delhi: Inspired by the decades-old National Women’s Party in the United States, a 36-year-old doctor and social activist launched a women’s only party in Delhi on Tuesday to fight for issues like reservation for women in Parliament and harassment of women at workplace. The newly formed National Women’s Party (NWP) is being headed by Swetha Shetty, who said the party’s goal was to represent women particularly the “underprivileged” who “have suffered at the hands of system”, “those who have run from office to office in expectation of some help to make their lives better and got nothing” and “those who suffered from domestic abuse or are struggling against the social establishment”. [caption id=“attachment_5751991” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. PTI[/caption] “The actual ground work for National Women’s Party began in 2012. The motive behind formation of National Women Party is to get 50 percent reservation for women candidates in Lok Sabha Election. Even in 2018 women rights are easily ignored and there is so much violence against women and no significant reformations are being considered so far hence we felt the need for women party," Shetty said. “The political world in India has been majorly male dominated and women have always felt excluded. The party will attempt to eradicate the present challenges as there is need for women participants who understand the subject more delicately. Women empowerment will be a fair play to persistent paradoxes of our times,” she said. Shetty said while she was working with an NGO in Telangana, she worked upon the idea of starting a mass movement. “I want to make a national movement. To serve the original purpose women need higher commitment from the governing body. We need higher participation in the parliament to amend the laws for women welfare and progress,” she said. While Shetty urged more and more women to join the party to be able to collectively rake up the issues, she did not elaborate on any plans of contesting any elections.