Udhagamandalam: There are 23 candidates in the fray from the three assembly constituencies of Ooty, Coonoor and Gudalur (reserve) in the Nilgiris district. But there is only a woman candidate. While none of the recognized political parties didn’t deem it fit to field a woman candidate, the sole woman candidate in the district was fielded by a registered party - Naam Tamizhar Katchi.
The Nilgiris hasn’t sent a woman representative to the state assembly so far. The only woman to win an election in the hill retreat was Akkamma Devi, who contested from the Nilgiris parliamentary constituency in the 1962 Lok Sabha elections. Known as ‘daughter of the mountain’, she was the first Badaga woman to graduate from a college. She was fielded by the Indian National Congress.
While the Nilgiris is one of the districts in the state where women voters outnumber men, it isn’t known why the recognized political parties are shying away from fielding a woman candidate from at least a constituency.
DMK party cadre, who didn’t want to be identified, said, “In politics, women are not treated equal to men. As in the local body elections, seats should be reserved for women in the assembly elections too. Lack of encouragement from families is another reason for women not taking up politics seriously.”
According to a source, a woman member of a national party had expressed her interest to contest from Ooty constituency on the party ticket. “Despite being a fairly familiar face in the constituency, the party denied her the ticket.”
A district functionary of the AIADMK said the candidates were selected at the party’s high level based on several criteria.
Dr S Suresh Babu, MNM candidate from the Ooty constituency, said, “Generally, women are not coming forward to take part in active politics. For that matter, general public are hesitant to join politics, as a stigma is attached to it. Politics is a different proposition altogether. Not only women, the general public should also enter politics with some ideology and change the existing proposition to see more women in politics in future.”