Digi gender divide worsened in India in recent years, says report

Gender gap score declined between 2014 and 2021

The Indian market might be the second largest in terms of active mobile broadband subscriptions after the African continent and the fastest growing in the world, but the digital divide between the genders is not only high, it is growing.

A report, titled State of India’s Digital Economy 2023, presented by ICRIER Prosus Centre for Internet and the Digital Economy (IPCIDE) on Friday points out that India has the lowest gender parity in access to mobile ownership among the G20 countries and this disparity has worsened in recent years.

India’s gender gap score in mobile ownership has fallen from around 75 in 2014 to over 50 in 2021. In 2014 Indonesia (was as low as 20) and South Africa were below India, but both have overtaken India and improved their scores. In the case of South Africa it has seen a dramatic improvement with the scores jumping from 20 to over 70 between 2014 and 2021. All other countries –
except Japan, which has fallen – including Turkey, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, have shown substantial progress on this front.

The report says that 29 per cent of rural women use the internet, which is far lower than men, 40 per cent of whom access the internet. And while access to mobile phones for women has improved from 46 per cent in 2015 to 54 per cent in 2021 the gender gap in mobile phone use has risen. This is in sharp contrast to how many G20 countries have closed the gender gap.

India clearly is in the lower end of the pecking order when one looks at the percentage of women using the internet across countries. The Indian number based on IMRB data places it at 40 per cent, while the National Family Health Survey pegged it at 33 per cent. Whichever measure one looks at, the fact is that only women in African countries use the internet less. India is also far lower than the world average, which is at 57 per cent.

Looking at it from the income perspective, the share of women on the internet is lower than in lower middle income countries, but better than least developed and low income states.

The digital divide, of course, persists between rural and urban areas. In 2021, only 37 per cent of the rural populace was active on the internet, compared with 69 per cent in urban areas.