Electoral Participation of Muslim Women in India: A Comparative Study

The aim of the research was to study the status of political participation of Muslim women in two culturally different settings in the States of Karnataka in the South and Uttar Pradesh in the North and understand the views of the Muslim community on religious restrictions, if any, on the political participation of Muslim women. Do the Indian Muslim women have political aspirations? Do they fight elections; as nominees of political parties or as independents? While the political participation of Indian women per se has been extensively studied, the status of Muslim women has not received much attention.
This study is based on extensive fieldwork in 9 districts of Uttar Pradesh and 6 districts of Karnataka. Besides over 200 individual Muslim women, the views of a number of Islamic scholars, Muslim academicians, professional and students were collected in the form of written replies to questionnaire and during the course of personal interviews.