New Delhi: The Union government’s failure on April 17 to pass a constitutional amendment Bill to increase the number of seats in Parliament to 850 was a “very very big win for democracy”, said Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Saturday (April 18).Vadra was speaking at a press conference organised by the Congress on Saturday in New Delhi. She said that it was “very clear” that the bill was not about protecting women or bringing in reservation for women, but about delimitation – and doing it in such a way that will only benefit the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) so that they remain in power permanently.The Congress is not, and never will be, against women’s reservation. That the bill in its current form – which was aimed mainly at delimitation – wasn’t passed due to the unity of the Opposition parties in Parliament evidently came as a shock to the BJP, Vadra commented. The Opposition will stand united in future too, she added. ‘Big win for democracy’On April 17, for the first time in 12 years, the Narendra Modi government failed to pass a constitutional amendment bill which aimed to increase the number of seats in Parliament to 850. While the government said that this was being done to ensure women’s reservation, opposition parties had pointed out that this was a clear exercise of delimitation – which will lead to lesser representation for some states including several southern states based on population levels. As The Wire has fact-checked, several claims made by Union home minister Amit Shah to push the bill through – such as a uniform 50% increase in seats for all states – do not hold. At the floor test for the bill on the night of April 17, 298 votes were polled in favour and 230 against the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill, 2026. The government fell short by 54 votes to pass the bill, as it could not achieve a two-thirds majority.“What happened yesterday was a very, very big win for democracy,” Vadra said on April 18 at a press conference called by the Congress in New Delhi. “The government’s conspiracy to change the federal structure and weaken democracy was defeated. It was stopped. This was a win for the Constitution, the country and a united opposition.”The entire plot was laid out (to push delimitation through), like a “conspiracy”, so that in some way or the other the BJP can remain in power permanently, Gandhi said. “And how did they do this? Using women. In the name of women,” she said.If the bill didn’t go through, then parties opposing delimitation would be branded as anti-women, so that the BJP would then emerge as the saviour for women, she added.‘Cannot trust BJP with delimitation’“We are women, we know that it is not easy to become a saviour for women. You have to show it by doing it…women are watching. They have seen Unnao, Hathras, Olympic players who were sitting here in Delhi’s streets, who asked them? They have seen the women in Manipur…and now you are standing in Parliament and saying you want to become the saviour of women,” asked Vadra at the press conference on Saturday. It was very clear that this bill was not about protecting women, but about delimitation, she added. Delimitation is being sold as the need of the hour but it is not, she said. She said that delimitation of 20, 30 and 40 seats has been done before but a complete overhaul of Parliament had not been done – “and that too in the hands of people who tend to have disregard for institutions, who tend to weaken every institution, including the Election Commission”. “How can you expect us to support this? It is not possible for anybody who loves democracy, who loves this country to support such a thing,” she added. “Firstly, there’s the issue that men are trying to reserve their own seats – so that out of 543, their seats do not go to women…Secondly, we cannot trust them with delimitation. What we have seen in Assam and J and K – they are completely designed in a way that they will win. In a way that benefits them.”“It is a Black Day for them [the government] because they’ve felt a shock for the first time, which they deserved,” she said. “The problems of women today are growing exponentially. The struggle is growing. Women aren’t fools. They see everything. That PR and media hype won’t work anymore. If you want to do something concrete, bring back the bill that was passed unanimously in 2023, supported by all parties. If you need to make a few small amendments to it so it can be implemented now, do it and implement it now. Give women their rights, right now. But don’t try to mislead them by twisting it around and attaching it to other things. It is a straightforward thing. Do it now. We’re all ready.”Not against women’s reservationVadra reiterated that the Congress was not, and never would be, against reservation for women in Parliament. “We are saying this very clearly, and we will say this from every platform, in every state, and every party of the INDIA Alliance will say this…Bring in the 2023 legislation that was already passed, make whatever change you want, bring it in by 2029, we will fully support it. We will say this again and again, all over the country,” she said.Just like women’s reservation, there should also be OBC representation commiserate with the number, Vadra added. In response to a question about the BJP saying that they will initiate a countrywide campaign to call the entire opposition including the Congress as anti-women, Vadra said that the people of this country are “very prudent” and will no longer take any statement at “face value”. “If they want to campaign countrywide, let them do so openly. But the country is not in the same state as it was 12 years ago…The people of India are watching, and can see through the PR, media hype, big campaigns. So much money has been put into these but this is not working anymore. Yesterday Amit Shah said over and over again that please trust what we are saying. No one is trusting. The real point is that people will no longer take statements at face value.” ‘BJP wanted political credit’It is very visible from their actions that things have changed for this government, Vadra said. They are under a lot of international pressure and a lot of actions they have taken are ones that are not in the interest of the nation. For instance, no Indian Prime Minister would have accepted the terms of the deal made with the US unless they are under massive pressure, Vadra said. “It is very obvious. The public is seeing this. The public continues to suffer from multiple problems. The price of gas, fruits, vegetables, everything has gone up especially the burden of this is on the shoulders of women, across class, caste, rural or urban. And there is nothing coming from the government to resolve them. The public can see this. So they can take their mahila morcha wherever they want…this country has now awakened to the fact that they [the BJP] do not stand by their words, they cannot be trusted and certainly women cannot trust them because we have seen their attitude and behavior on multiple occasions…The chronology of the last few days, the way they have brought this bill, the things they have attached to it, the delimitation, the 2011 census, it’s very clear – they knew this bill is not going to be passed, they just wanted the political credit.”‘A united opposition’This is a time in India’s history when there is more stress on people and difficulties are becoming greater (in terms of price rises and so on), but the opposition has shown its unity, Vadra said. “We are not just united as the opposition, there is also the fact that there is this mood amongst people, they are fed up with lies, they see through a lot of media propaganda. They are looking more towards finding out the truth. The opposition in the actions yesterday in parliament, we have stood for the truth, we have stood for the Constitution, we have stood for the nation and we have stood as one,” she said. She added that it was very clear from the expressions on the faces of BJP leaders in Parliament that this came as a shock to them, and that they were defeated for perhaps the first time in 12 years.“From now on, we fight harder, we stand together and hopefully we will push through much more than we did before.”