Social Roots of Local Politics: Women Contestants in the Panchayat Elections of Uttar Pradesh (2015)

Competitiveness is a sign of progress in both economic and political arenas. There has been a significant rise in the number of contestants and heightened competition in the 2015 elections of village heads in Uttar Pradesh in which women contested in large numbers. The institutional incentive of the 73rd Amendment to the Constitution certainly acted as a booster. But an empirical account of people’s perceptions presents an untold story of social institutionalization which reinforces the submissiveness of women who contest elections primarily for preserving family position and prestige and rarely out of independent choice. The study takes a closer look at the factors that trigger higher contestation and women’s participation as candidates in village head elections. The study goes beyond the explanations offered by top-down approaches to electoral democracy and institutional studies of decentralization to account for specificities of gender dynamics in local politics.