The Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam is a landmark constitutional amendment, officially enacted as the Constitution (One Hundred and Sixth Amendment) Act, 2023. It was introduced in the Lok Sabha on September 19, 2023, during a special session of Parliament. The Act's primary purpose is to address the historically low representation of women in India's legislative bodies, where women held only about 15.2% of seats in the Lok Sabha as of 2023.
The mechanism of the Act mandates the reservation of one-third (33%) of all seats for women in the Lok Sabha, the State Legislative Assemblies, and the Legislative Assembly of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. This quota also includes a sub-reservation for women belonging to the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) within the seats already reserved for those categories. The reservation is set to be in effect for a period of 15 years from its commencement, with the possibility of extension by a parliamentary initiative.
The Act works by inserting three new articles into the Constitution: Article 330A for the Lok Sabha, Article 332A for State Legislative Assemblies, and Article 239AA for the Delhi Assembly. A key provision, Article 334A, stipulates that the reservation will only come into effect after a delimitation exercise is undertaken, based on the census data published after the commencement of the Act. This mechanism connects the Act to the Delimitation Act, as the reserved seats for women will be rotated after each successive delimitation exercise.
The concept has a long history, with the first Women's Reservation Bill being proposed decades ago, and similar bills failing to pass in 1996, 1998, 1999, and 2008. The current Act replaced the previous attempts and was passed in 2023. The most recent change involves the implementation timeline: the original framework linked the rollout to a future Census and delimitation, which would have delayed it until around 2034. However, the government has signaled a move to operationalize the Act for the 2029 general elections, potentially by basing the delimitation on the 2011 Census to fast-track the process. The Act does not apply to the Rajya Sabha or State Legislative Councils.