Dr.
Devendra Kothari
Population
and Development Analyst
Forum
for Population Action
In India there are two great evils. Trampling on the women, and grinding the poor through caste restrictions.
Swami Vivekananda
Our Women (p. 61)
Gender equality is more than a goal in itself. It
is a precondition for meeting the challenges of reducing poverty and promoting
productivity. So, how is women's status in India? No doubt, in many ways, today
is the best time in modern history of India to be a girl. Opportunities for a
girl's successes are as unlimited as her dreams. It appears that the condition
of women in India has undoubtedly improved in the last couple of decades.
However, the extent of this improvement is mainly confined to middle classes.
Even among middle class families, this change has been very slow and it has
benefited only a small portion of women, mainly the educated ones and that too only
in big cities.
According to Gender Gap
Index (GGI) Report 2017, released
by the World Economic Forum, India is simply not doing enough for its
girls/women. The country ranked 108 out of 144 countries in 2017, behind China
and Bangladesh.
In fact, India slipped by 21 places compared to 87th rank last year. Further, India’s ranking has been falling steadily since
2006 when the Index was launched. [1] That is a shameful reflection of the condition
of the women/girls in a country that is on a growth song. Available data indicate that the
poor health conditions and discrimination in opportunities for work and income
still haunt women. It appears that India is simply not doing enough for its
women to improve access to resources and freedom of movement as well as about
decision making.
As a
result, India has witnessed an alarming increase in the number of missing
girls. It is estimated that around 3 million girls in age group 0-6 have gone missing in 2011
Census. In other words, during 2001-11, on an average, the number of girls
missing in India was 300,000 per year or 820 per day. The number of
missing girls for the consecutive census periods 1981-91 and 1991-2001 were 0.5
million and 2 million, respectively.
As a
result, India is among countries with the worst child sex ratios in the world.
The 2011 census showed that the child sex ratio, number of girls per 1,000 boys
between the ages 0-6, has dipped from 945 girls in 1991 to 919 girls in 2011.
To
understand the rising phenomenon of missing girls, one has to analyse the
complex calculus that Indian would-be parents go through - when to have a
child, how many, and boy or girl. A survey, conducted by the Forum for
Population Action, an NGO working on population and development issues, in a community inhabited by the middle and
lower classes including slum dwellers in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India in 2010 revealed some interesting facts (Table 1).
The main objective of the survey was to understand the fertility preferences
and contraceptive uses. Around 200 couples were selected randomly with the help
of local telephone directory, who had married between 1990 and 1995. Though the
sample size is small, findings indicate a strong preference for sons as well as
for a small family. The survey findings clearly indicate that Indian women with
son (s) are more likely to stop having children than those with any daughters;
also indicate a strong relationship between family size and the proportion of
female children in a family.
Table 1 Distribution of couples by number of children, Jaipur, India 2010
Couple with:
|
Number of
couples
|
Percent of
total couples
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
No children
|
3
|
1.5
|
One son
|
16
|
8
|
Two sons
|
21
|
10.5
|
One daughter
|
5
|
2.5
|
Two daughters
|
14
|
7
|
One son and one daughter
|
39
|
19.5
|
One daughter and one son
|
42
|
21
|
More than two children
|
58
|
29
|
Did not answer
|
2
|
1
|
All
|
200
|
100
|
Source: Kothari, Devendra. 2010. “Fertility
preferences in an urban locality,
Rajasthan: An analysis of survey data”, FPA
Occasional Paper 8, Forum
for Population action, Jaipur, India.
Also, the
findings clearly indicate that the sex ratio is poor when women have one or two
children, but gets better as they have more children. Two factors are at play
here. One is sex-selective abortions and the other is sex-selective ‘stopping
practices’, which is stopping having children based on sex of those born. It is
observed that women stop childbearing if the first one or two births are sons
and even girls.
The findings of the latest National Family Health Survey
(NFHS- 2015-16) support this trend. The survey showed that almost 30 per cent women
with one child had got sterilised, suggesting that they had decided they did
not want any more. Almost 84 per cent of women with two children had got
sterilised. This was the case for 77 per cent of the poorest women who had two
children and almost 89 per cent of women in the highest wealth quintile with
two kids. This indicates that even poor do not want more children.
Now
question arises why many couples don’t like the birth of a girl child? It is
widely observed that growing up as a girl in India in the prevailing
environment is a challenge in itself.
Girl/woman is made to feel like it is all her fault. It is just like that when
investigating crimes of passion, the French Police are said to use the mantra –
'cherchez la femme' (find the woman)
in establishing a motive. This preconceived notion that whatever the ills
afflicting us, from crime to unemployment, girls/women must be at the root of
them is gaining ground in India's male-oriented society.[2]
Much of
the discrimination has to do with cultural beliefs and social norms that have
become more pronounced in the deteriorating governance or low and order. There
has been a continuous rise in the incidence of crimes committed against women
over the years. Girls are raped, beaten, dumped even in the metros like New
Delhi. Raising a girl child in such a situation is very difficult. One can
ask questions: Save girl child for what? Eve-teasing? Dowry? Rapes? Domestic
violence? This what we have in store for girls? This is why we want to save
them?
It
appears that female's abhivyakti (expression), khvaab (dream),
or kalpana (fantasy) frightens males. And they want to regulate it
by hook and crook. It
appears “women are not born, but made”. What better than India to exemplify
this statement by Simone de Beauvoir, made some 70 years ago. [3] One has
to recognize that high GDP or economic growth
alone does not automatically empower women nor does it reduce gender
inequality.
What do
we do then? No doubt, expanding education and employment opportunities will
help in achieving gender equality but that may take more time. To expedite the
process, “we need men to be allies”, as argued by Melinda Gates, in her
article: Women Transform Societies,
based on Indian experiences. [4] Expanding argument, she writes: “women's
empowerment can't be just about women; it also has to be about men - the
fathers, brothers, husbands, and sons – with whom they live their lives.”
In my paper - Empowering Women in India: Need for a Feminist Agenda - it
is argued that there is an urgent need to formulating a feminist agenda to
empower women living in highly patriarchal and traditional surroundings with
several obstacles. [5] The
‘agenda’ is based on the premises that
efficient policing, stringent punishments and legal measures would
reduce the incidences of crime against women but these cannot eliminate growing
gender inequality in India unless and until the mindset of the society changes.
Women-centred reproductive health care along-with enlarged education and
employment opportunities for females may alter patriarchal constructs despite
strong structural resistance. And this feminist agenda will contribute to
women’s empowerment significantly and reduce gender gap.
That can
happen only from more deliberate and direct public policy interventions to
change the mindset. Men does what does they see in their own family and
surroundings. People question government’s inability, but it would require
reforms in child rearing as well education in schools regarding gender equity -
respecting women and their dignity. Mothers need to learn to treat daughters
equally as they do for their sons. It
means one has to work at the family level.
With the help of grassroots workers like ASHA and Anganwadi Workers, one can achieve this. These
workers should be trained to change the minds
of young and old about everything: from the age at which girls should be
married to whether men and boys should help with housework. And such
campaign will drive home the point that girls are to be celebrated.
The path ahead looks long, winding and hazy. However,
the present administration shows the promise and will to clean the path, albeit
slowly. The government also recognizes that gender equality is part and parcel
of the country's future; and campaigns like “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (Save the
girl child, educate the girl child) will help promote gender equity. To make
BBBP more effective, the government has clubbed it with Nutrition (Poshan)
Mission on the International Women Day 2018.
[1] The index measures gender gap as progress towards parity between men and
women in four indicators: (i) Educational attainment, (ii) Health and survival,
(iii) Economic opportunity, and (iv) Political empowerment.
[2] TOI Edit. 2015. “Jobs (only) for the boys: Women
are being seen as the root of all our ills, including unemployment” at:
https://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/toi-editorials/jobs-only-for-the-boys-women-are-being-seen-as-the-root-of-all-our-ills-including-unemployment/
[3] The Second Sex (French: Le Deuxième Sexe) is a 1949 book by Simone de Beauvoir, in which the author discusses the
treatment of women throughout history. Beauvoir researched and wrote the book
in about 14 months when she was 38 years old. The Second Sex is
often regarded as a major work of feminist philosophy and the starting point of
second-wave of feminism.
[4] Gates, Melinda.
2016. “Women transform societies”, Times of India at:
Blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/toi-edit-page/women-transform-societies/
[5] Kothari, Devendra. 2014. “Empowering women in India: Need for a Feminist
Agenda”, Journal of Health Management, 16 (2),
233-43
