A Talk on “The persistence of the gender gap: understanding the under-representation of women in Indian politics” by Dr Rashmi Singh
ABOUT THE TALK
The gender gap in Indian politics continues and there has been only a gradual inclusion of women in greater numbers at different levels of elected representation. This talk takes an overview of the literature that examines this persistent under-representation and the shift in feminist scholarship on the subject towards examining political parties and their internal politics as one of the missing puzzles of this recurring ‘pipeline problem’. Drawing on ethnographic and qualitative work with women politicians at the local and state level, and on party practices in the municipal politics of Delhi, as well as the conceptual framework employed by feminist institutionalist scholars, this talk will examine the representation deficit and the gendered nature of the selection processes in parties that underscores this gap.
This talk will be moderated by Yazad Bhacka, Student, SIAS, Krea University.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dr Rashmi Singh is a political sociologist who researches Indian politics, electioneering and political candidacy. She received her PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2021 and teaches at the O P Jindal Global University. Her research interests include contemporary Indian politics, social movements and organisational politics, and gender and party politics. Previous to Jindal, she was a Junior Research Fellow at the Merian-Tagore International Centre of Advanced Studies in New Delhi. Her research has appeared in the Economic and Political Weekly, the Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, the Caravan, the India Forum, and other platforms. Her forthcoming work uses a qualitative approach to examine the gendered nature of Indian electoral politics and examines the complexity of political representation and party nomination practices in Indian politics.