India promoting participation of women in every sector: PM at P20 summit

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said India is promoting participation of women in every sector with almost 50 per cent of the elected representatives in local self-government institutions being women.

The recent law on granting one-third reservation to women in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies will further enrich the country's parliamentary tradition, he said addressing the inaugural session of the ninth G20 Parliamentary Speakers' Summit (P20) here.

Prime Minister Modi also said that India has more than 900 TV channels in 28 languages to provide real-time information to people and more than 33,000 different newspapers are published in about 200 languages.

He emphasised the huge flow of information and the level of freedom of speech in India.

"In this world of the 21st century, this vibrancy of India, unity in diversity, is our greatest strength. This vibrancy inspires us to fight every challenge and solve every difficulty together," he said.

In his address, Inter-Parliamentary Union President Duarte Pacheco said maybe "if we have more women in the leadership of our countries, we will not have so many wars".

He said it was important to have more women in a participatory democracy.

Modi informed the delegates about the recent decision of reserving 33 per cent seats in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies for women.

He also told them that out of more than 30 lakh elected representatives in the local self-government institutions, almost 50 per cent are women.

"India today is promoting women's participation in every sector. The recent decision taken by our Parliament will further enrich our parliamentary tradition," the prime minister asserted.