At least 16.18 per cent of Himachal Pradesh, constituting nearly a dozen Assembly constituencies of the state, has higher number of women voters than men, yet the big parties in the state have shied away not only from fielding women candidates but also from talking about the issues concerning them.

While the BJP can be credited with trying to sell its scheme of raising the taxable income limit to Rs 3 lakh for women, this is mainly an issue concerning working women and fails to cut ice with housewives and rural women.

L K Advani had mentioned pan-India implementation of a ‘Ladli’ programme for improving education of girl child and giving financial security for girls’ education up till 18 years of age, the rest of the campaign of the BJP and the Congress has mainly been about the issue of reservation of women. Sonia Gandhi touched upon the topic at her Shimla rally, besides promising a special law on domestic violence.

Sutra, Himachal based NGO working on issues of women, recently completed an exercise to debate the issues concerning women at various places in the state and incorporated them in the people’s manifesto circulated in villages. The three main issues that came up were domestic violence, increasing crime against women and social security of old women.

Subhash Mendhapurkar, founder and Director of Sutra says, “It is sad that despite agreeing on the same issues raised during the Assembly election in year 2007, many MLAs have been silent on the issues. In the current election too, issues concerning women have not been addressed”.