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On Thursday, the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP)’s Hekani Jakhalu became the first ever woman to be elected to the Nagaland Legislative Assembly.
Though the state has had 13 state Assemblies so far, not one woman has been elected as an MLA till date. As counting was underway in the state on Thursday afternoon, Jakhalu was the sixth person to be officially declared winner by the Election Commission of India.
She received 45.16 per cent of the 31,874 votes in the constituency, just ahead of the Lok Jansakthi Party (Ram Vilas Paswan)’s Azheto Zhimomi, who received 40.34 per cent of the votes. The contest was neck and neck to the finish, with the numbers constantly see-sawing between the two.
For 48-year-old Jakhalu, it has been a long road to the Assembly.
She studied at Lady Shri Ram College for Women and Delhi University’s Faculty of Law and went on to do an LLM from the University of San Francisco. She subsequently worked at a law firm in Delhi. In 2005, she returned to Nagaland to start an NGO called YouthNet, which states its aim as “youth empowerment”.
She also did an executive education programme at Harvard University. In 2019, she won the Nari Shakti Puraskar from the Ministry of Child and Women Development.
Now, as a first-time legislator, she told The Indian Express that she has four points on her agenda.
“For 17 years, I have been working for young people within the NGO sector, but there is only that much that could be done from that position. That is why I wanted to be in policy making and enter the highest decision making body in the state. So, in the state and in my constituency, my focus will be on young people – on building them and nurturing them. And of course, as a woman MLA I will be fighting for women as well,” she said.
“My other goal is to make Dimapur III a model constituency. It has been neglected for too long. I want everyone to have access to their basic amenities and rights. And lastly, I will be fighting for minority communities. They make up half the population in the state and are the ones who are actually electing the MLAs and ministers of the constituency. But once the MLAs are voted into power, these people are forgotten,” she said.
After months of hectic campaigning, Jakhalu said she was relieved. However, she added that this was “only the first battle”. Gearing up to leave for Kohima on Thursday afternoon, she said: “I want to make sure that I get a good position now that ministries and portfolios will be formed. My team is working on it with me.”
