is a plain narrative of how seeds of a Working of the Indian complex party system were sown during Party System Political Parties and Party Systems edited by Ajay K Mehra, D D Khanna, Gert W Kueck; Sage Publications, Delhi, 2003;
Women's overwhelming support in the 2004 elections for the issues related to their public and political participation can definitely be regarded as a positive pointer towards the strengthening of women's politics in future. However, it is doubtful whether these pointers would suffice to mobilise women over the divisions on socio-economic problems, where women across different social groups differ in their opinions. The survey points out that women act as a single unit in certain respects and do not in certain others. Gender reality thus appears to be a layered reality.
On behalf of the marathas the state has invented a caste category, kunbi maratha, that is flexible enough to accommodate the dualities in maratha identity and fulfils the political claims of the caste within the limited sphere of politics of reservations. Not only the state but the dominant caste has neatly manipulated the reservation discourse.
Social groups working in the informal sector as labourers are among the most neglected groups under the present pattern of capitalist development. The state does not acknowledge their presence, nor does civil society accord them respectable status. Trade unions too have mirrored this attitude and have, by and large, failed to make efforts at organising them. The Hamal Panchayat is a successful attempt at mobilising these workers and has been attempting to create a broad-based political alliance of unorganised workers and the urban poor forcing both the state and civil society to recognise their specific identities and acknowledge their contribution to the economy and society.
For a Politically Sensitive Gender Discourse Rajeshwari Deshpande THERE is no doubt that the demand for and granting of reservations to women in political offices have proved to be mere tokenism. All the same, the discussion around the issue, both within and outside the women
