Kerala assembly polls: Women form half the electorate, but hold just fraction of power

Kerala’s enduring gender paradox in politics is set to persist, with women’s representation once again hovering between 9% and 13% across the three major fronts. Despite incremental gains over the decades, the assembly is unlikely to see more than 8–12 women MLAs, well within its historical range.The release of candidate lists once again reveals a familiar story in the numbers. BJP has fielded 14 women, CPM 11, Congress 9, CPI 5, IUML 2, Twenty20 3 and BDJS 3. These figures may shift slightly once final nominations are confirmed, but the overall picture is unlikely to change significantly. Discontent has already surfaced within UDF. Congress national spokesperson Shama Mohamed publicly criticized the party’s approach, noting that only 9 of 92 tickets were allotted to women. She pointed to a similar pattern in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, where just one woman was fielded from Kerala. “Denied but not defeated,” she wrote on X, calling for greater support for women within the party.Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor echoed the concern, though with caution. He acknowledged that allocating just 9.8% of seats to women is “not fair” in a state where women constitute half the population. At the same time, he noted that candidate selection involves multiple considerations, including winnability.Among those contesting, only a handful of sitting women MLAs are in the fray across UDF and LDF. Notably, CPI’s C K Asha has been denied a seat, while the constituency of K Jameela remains vacant following her death.For historian and social critic J Devika, the issue goes beyond numbers. “It has become a joke. This has long ceased to be a matter for discussion—it should have translated into representation by now,” she said. Devika argues that the problem is rooted in political culture. She finds some hope in Congress women, noting that they came together to raise their voices against Rahul Mamkootathil and forced his exit. Their willingness to speak openly about internal issues, she says, makes them more democratic than other parties.Devika said the feminist movement in the state should focus on grooming and skilling women as leaders, pointing out that many have already proven themselves in governance in local bodies. Rather than merely lobbying the govt, she said, civil society feminism should be pressuring it to wake up. Women in the state have long demonstrated their capabilities across every sector, yet they remain unable to push through a resolution for gender parity in political spaces, she said.The contrast is stark. Women make up nearly 51% of Kerala’s electorate—1.38 crore out of 2.69 crore voters, according to the state election commission’s Feb 2026 data. Yet this numerical strength has not reshaped candidate selection.If the women’s reservation bill were implemented, Kerala could have as many as 47 women MLAs. For now, that remains distant. The state’s highest representation—13 women legislators in 1996—still stands, while its lowest points, in 1967 and 1977, saw just one woman in the assembly.