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Women's Bill: SP and RJD withdraws support to UPA

By The Assam Tribune

NEW DELHI, March 8 (PTI): Government's move to go in for Women's Reservation Bill today had its first fallout with the Samajwadi Party and the RJD announcing withdrawal of support to the coalition led by Congress.

The decision by SP, with 21 members in Lok Sabha, and RJD with four will, however, have no impact on the stability of the UPA government. The SP and the RJD were outside supporters of the government.

Angry SP president Mulayam Singh Yadav and RJD chief Lalu Prasad slammed the Congress for its move to "unilaterally" go ahead with the Bill which seeks 33 per cent reservation for women in Lok Sabha and State Assemblies.

"This is a political dacoity. We will not tolerate it ... We are withdrawing support to the government," said Prasad with Yadav standing by his side and supporting him. He later said, "We have withdrawn support on this issue".

Rajya Sabha: Unruly scenes were witnessed with MPs from the Samajwadi Party (SP), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) tearing the document into shreds and hurling it at Chairman Hamid Ansari.

Missing women: At least 100 million (10 crore) women are missing in seven Asian countries, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) said on Monday. It said 85 million of them are from India and China.

"While Asia and the Pacific can take pride in the regions' vibrant economic transformation in recent decades, this has not translated into progress on gender equality," a fresh UNDP report released on the occasion of International Women's Day said here.

"In 2007, the number of women and girls who were missing - who died because of discriminatory treatment in access to health and nutrition or who were eliminated before they were born - was close to an estimated 100 million in seven Asian countries," the report revealed.

The seven countries are India, Bangladesh, China, Iran, South Korea, Nepal and Pakistan.

"Together India and China account for an estimated 85 million of these missing women," the report added.

The report said while China accounted for 42.6 million missing women, the figure for India was 42.7 million. Pakistan, with over 6.1 million missing women, stands number three in the infamous tally.

The UN body said that Sri Lanka was doing much better to tackle the menace than any other country in the region.

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