'Unattractive rural women won't benefit from reservation'

Lucknow/Barabanki, Nov 10: Samajwadi Party (SP) chief and former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav stirred a controversy on Thursday when he said at a rural rally in Barabanki that rural women would not benefit from the women's reservation bill for they were not as attractive as their counterparts from the affluent class.

Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and Congress leader Rita Bahuguna Joshi at a function in Lucknow on Friday.

The SP leader said this while explaining his opposition to the lone-pending women's reservation bill. Mulayam's SP is currently in power in UP and is led by his son Akhilesh Yadav.

"Bade bade gharon ki ladkiya aur mahilayan kewal upar ja sakti hain...yaad rakhna...apko mauka nahi milega..hamare gaon ki mahila me akarshan itna nahin (only girls and women from affluent class can go forward...remember this...you (rural women) will not get a chance...Our rural women do not have that much attraction)," he said at a rally in Barabanki on Thursday.

However, Mulayam said in Lucknow on Friday that his party could think of supporting the bill if Dalits, Muslims and backward classes were brought under its ambit.

OneIndia News