Mohammad Hamid Ansari: Holistic measures needed to improve women's status

In May 2013 the government of India in the Ministry of Women and Child Development, and based on the recommendation of a Committee of Governors constituted by the President of India, established a High Level Committee on the Status of Women with professor Pam Rajput as its chairperson. The committee’s 1,008-page report in three volumes was submitted in June 2015. Its findings highlight the following:

- In 2015 the socio-cultural landscape for women is a complex mix of old and new. Industrialisation, globalisation, urbanisation and modernisation have brought some positive and some problematic changes for women. Migration, skewed sex ratios and environmental degradation have added to women’s vulnerabilities.

- India is a male-dominated society in which economic, political, religious, social and cultural institutions are largely controlled by men. This control extends over almost all aspects of women’s lives through various discriminatory social practices and institutions. A combination of family, caste, community and religion reinforces and legitimises these patriarchal values. Stereotyping of women and their roles continues in public and private institutions and is perpetuated by the media.

- This paradoxical situation of women in India is alarming. While they are worshipped as goddesses, they are also burnt for dowry. Boys are more desirable. Girls are considered an unwanted burden; they suffer in silence as abuse, violence, rape and early marriage are inflicted on them. When and if they break their silence, the repercussions are immense. Discriminatory practices, such as gender-biased sex selection, child marriage, dowry, honour killings and witch hunting are indicative of these vulnerabilities.

- The government has recognised these paradoxes and attempted to address them in policies, legislation and programmes. These have produced mixed results. Legislative changes have faced resistance in their implementation due to social cultural and religious mores.

- Although 30 departments of the government have women-specific and pro-women allocations, these together account for a meagre 5.8 per cent of the total budget.

- In 2015 India has one of the worst gender gaps in the world when it comes to labour force participation. Only 25 per cent of women are working, less than half a per cent are seeking work. There is a growing phenomenon of “informalisation” and “casualisation” across rural and urban work opportunities. Over the last decade, there has been a steady decline of women in the workplace. An International Monetary Fund study has estimated that if the number of women workers were to increase to the same level as the number of men, India’s gross domestic product would expand by 27 per cent.

The report observes that the number of women who have excelled despite these handicaps “is minuscule” and that its analysis shows that “change is painfully slow, ambivalent and desperate for clear direction” and that “comprehensive programming must have the ability to recognise and address the needs and aspirations of women differentiated along lines of caste, class, age and life stages/situations and other diversities”. They must be holistic rather than piecemeal and include measures to address overall health needs including sexual and reproductive health, literacy, education, safety and violence-free spaces, fulfilment of aspirations for personal and political growth, and economic empowerment.

It is accepted in the report that “through a combination of family, caste, community and religion, among others, patriarchal values and ideas are constantly reinforced and legitimised”. 

The report notes that progressive legislative initiatives “are not accompanied by commensurate changes in the culture of institutions” charged with the responsibility of implementing them and that “processes of empowerment must permeate institutions that hold the key to massive transformation including religion as practiced, family, marriage, educational, law and order, judiciary and media”.

The report alludes to, but does not specifically address the root causes of this state of affairs. No suggestions appear to have been made as to how “the culture of institutions” has to be made and how social practices, supposedly based on culture and traditions, in different segments of the wider community is to be initiated.A question on the report in the Rajya Sabha on March 3, 2016, was answered by the minister for women and child welfare. It summarised the recommendations under general heads but did not indicate the proposed course of action by the government except for drawing attention to the existing legislation on protection of women from domestic violence and to certain features of the Hindu Succession Act, 2005. 

Two months later, in May this year, the Ministry of Women and Child Welfare unveiled on its website the draft of a National Policy for Women: Articulating a Vision for Empowerment. This asserts that a rapidly changing scenario “gives rise to complex socio-economic and cultural challenges for women in a society with deep-rooted cultural and social beliefs about women”, that “a lot still remains to be done” to “ultimately positioning women as equal partners of sustained development progress that the country is experiencing at present”. It aims to create “an effective framework” and “conducive socio-cultural, 

economic and political environment to enable women to enjoy de jure and de facto fundamental rights to realise their full potential”.

The term “patriarchy” does not find a mention in this document. In another question answered in the Rajya Sabha on July 21, 2016, the minister said “certain recommendations” of the High Level Committee on the status of separated/divorced/widowed women have been “suitably included” in the Draft National Policy. Two questions on the National Policy for Empowerment of Women, 2001 were also answered in the Lok Sabha on February 2 and November 18, 2016. These gave details of the legislative enactments since 2001 and the latter observed that “large number of women today are able to exercise their choices by taking recourse to the law as empowerment is all about choices”.

Edited extract from a lecture by Vice President Mohammad Hamid Ansari on “Dismantling Patriarchy?” at the Sunanda Bhandare Memorial Lecture in New Delhi on November 30