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Historic win
for Asian Women in UK General Election 2010
11 May 2010
 The
UK General Election 2010 resulted in a historic
win for five Asian Women who succeeded in becoming
Members of Parliament. Priti Patel who won the
seat of Witham in Essex for the Conservative Party
is the first Asian woman from her party to have
won a seat. The Labour Party saw a decisive four
Asian women: Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and
Bow), Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East), Shabana
Mahmood (Birmingham Ladywood) and Valerie Vaz
(Walsall South). Keith and Valerie Vaz have also
set a new record as the first brother and sister
duo to have won seats in British General Election
- Keith Vaz retained his seat of Leicester East
which he first won in 1987.
In
total 22 Asian Women stood for office with five
(22.7%) attaining office. The first Asian to been
elected as MP in Britain was Dadabhai Naoroji, known
as the "Grand Old Man of India", who was
elected for the Liberal Party in Finsbury Central
at the 1892 general election. Naoroji was a Parsi
intellectual, educator, cotton trader, and an early
Indian political leader. Ironically it was another
118 years before the first Asian women MPs were
elected in his footsteps.
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