Bihar assembly polls 2025: parties field few women — RJD tops with 24 women candidates while overall representation remains far below the 33% quota.
As Bihar heads to assembly polls in 2025, women’s representation among party candidates is strikingly low despite women forming nearly half the population and a strong voter bloc. The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has named the most women — 24 candidates (about 16.78% of its picks) — while Congress has given just five women tickets (8.61%). Both the BJP and JD(U) have fielded 13 women each (roughly 12.87% of their slates). Overall, the NDA has 35 women candidates (14.40%) and the INDIA bloc 32 (13.16%) — well short of a one-third target.
Historically, Bihar’s highest female representation in the assembly was in 2010 when 34 women (14%) won seats; the current house has only about 10.7% women members. Activists and analysts say electability calculations, entrenched local power networks and tokenism — fielding women in non-winnable seats or as relatives of strongmen — help explain why parties promise benefits to women voters but hesitate to back more women as winnable candidates.
The mismatch matters: women’s turnout in recent Bihar polls has consistently outpaced men’s, and schemes aimed at women’s welfare have been central to state politics. To change representation, parties must adopt systematic candidate-building, reserve winnable seats for women and invest in grassroots leadership programs. For search impact, target long-tail queries like “women candidates in Bihar assembly 2025 list,” “why are so few women contesting Bihar polls 2025,” and short phrases like “Bihar women representation 2025” to capture both informational and local intent.
