Tag Archives: Gender Inequality

Education

DO WOMEN REALLY GET EQUAL RIGHTS AT THE WORKPLACE?

Despite its growing economy, India is one of the countries having lowest female labour force participation in the wold.The rate of working women in our country is not something to be proud of. The reasons of this can be be many such as personal safety, security including fear of sexual harassment and oppressive social norms that restricts women’s mobility, do prevent women from seeking employment and confine her to primary caregiver roles. There are so many reasons which prevent women to work and even if they work, they don’t get equal opportunities and rights at their work place. It is said that women now or equal to men in every field but is really so? It’s unfortunate to say, but no it is not true at all. The working women needs to fight for their rights, to make their position equal and to gain respect . Women are generally discriminated mostly during work pay.Even if a man and a woman are at equal position, have equal responsibilities, still women gets much less salary than than the man.And these things are not only in service sectors but can also be found in sports and entertainment industries as well. Many celebrities from the entertainment industry have spoken on this topic and have clearly shown their anger over this issue.

According to a report, women only have three-quarters of the employment rights of men worldwide.The world bank’s women,business and the law index reveals only Belgium, Denmark, France, Iceland, Latvia, Luxembourg, Sweden and Canada are the nations which give equal rights to men and women. The report makes clear that giving equal employment rights and increasing female participation in labour markets has clear economic benefits.The World Economic Forum’s gender gap report fund that, although there has been some progress in some areas, it will be a century before the world over enjoy equal rights with men.Below I’ll be sharing 5 Women’s Employment rights which everybody should know about :

THE MATERNITY BENEFIT AMENDMENT ACT, 2017 – This act has now made it necessary for business to educate a female employee of her rights under the Act at the time of appointment. The female government employees are qualified for maternity leave for a time of 180 days for their initial two live conceived kids. The new act has additionally presented the choice of telecommuting/work from home for new moms.

THE SEXUAL HARASSMENT OF WOMEN AT WORKPLACE ACT, 2013 -Sexual harassment at work is not uncommon and we come across various cases dealing with harassment at the workplace. Apart from dealing with sexual harassment complaints, an employer has additional obligation in the nature of providing a safe working environment , treat sexual harassment as a misconduct and organizing workshops and awareness programmes at regular intervals for sensitizing employees on the issues and implications of sexual harassment at the workplace.

THE FACTORIES ACT, 1948 – The factories Act is a legislation to secure to the workers employed in a factory, health, safety, welfare, proper working hours and other benefits.State government from time to time issue notifications for amending provisions of the Factories Act, which would be application to workers in factories in that particular state.

THE EQUAL REMUNERATION ACT, 1976 – Under this act, the employers shall pay equal remuneration to its male and female carrying out the same or similar work and employers cannot discriminate between men and women while recruiting unless there is a restriction under the law to employ women in certain industries.

SHOPS AND ESTABLISHMENT ACTS – The state government enact their respective shops and establishment act, regulates the working conditions pf employees in a shop or commercial establishment. This act provide for various provisions pertaining to notice period, leave entitlement, and working conditions like weekly working hours, weekly off, overtime etc.

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Education, Social Studies

High time we prioritize female literacy!

Why do Indian girls outperform boys in school, year after year?

Greater female literacy and education is recognized across the world as a powerful contributor to women’s empowerment. India has seen significant increase in the overall literacy rates from 18% in 1950s to about 74% in the last decade. However, there is huge gender disparity in literacy that is prevalent in India. While the literacy rate for men is at 80% it is just at 64% for females. Compared with the rest of the world female literacy rate is just at 60% which is 22% less than the global average.

Low literacy rate hinders women’s participation in the workforce which is an important factor for demographic transition (from high to low mortality and fertility rates). According to a 2017 study, lower infant mortality rates have been directly linked to higher education levels of the mothers as can be seen from a regional breakdown of female literacy rates in India. Kerala, the state with the highest female literacy rate (92%), has the lowest infant mortality rate of 10, whereas Bihar and UP with the lowest female literacy rate of 53% and 59% respectively has a high infant mortality rate, 177.5 and 141.2 respectively.

India falls short in female literacy - The Hindu
Female Literacy Rate of poorer countries is much higher than India

Women’s education also had a greater impact on family planning as observed in Bangladesh. Bangladeshi women show high level of awareness of family planning matters and a much higher use of contraceptives than in India. This has led to a dramatic reduction of fertility in a very short period. No comparable changes can be observed in India. This has happened because 88% of women are literate in Bangladesh as compared to 64% in India. The gains in female education has led to an increase participation of women in the workforce whereas in India female employment has gone backwards from 37% in 2005 to 29% in 2009.

If we want to become 5 trillion economy by 2022 we will have to educate our female population and going by the current progress rate, universal literacy can only be achieved by 2060. It is high time that we work collectively to educate our females and not be shy to ask for help from our neighbors who are performing better than us in bringing gender equality.

Research Paper

the concept of gender roles : what we think and what it is…….

Although, we have known the word gender in grammar obviously, it is being used differently now. The word gender is now being used Sociologically, or as a conceptual category, and it has been given a specific meaning. In its new incarnation gender refers to the socio-cultural definition of man and woman and assign them social roles. It is used as an analytical tool to understand social realities with regard to women and men.

The nature of this article is not based on feminism but to define what people see in terms of gender roles. Today also it is taught in school textbooks of kids that a woman is meant to be a house maker or a teacher or a nurse and same as a man is meant to be a doctor or a business person. When these jobs are reversed, we fall into a huge whirlpool of thoughts, is it even possible. And we sometimes take these things to be wrong. But, this is not the way gender roles works.

Gender Division of Labour: Gender division of labour, refers to the different roles, responsibilities, and tasks to women and men based on societal ideas of what men and women should do and are capable of doing. Different tasks are assigned to girls and boys, women and men according to their sex-gender roles, and not necessarily according to their individual prefrences/ capabilities.

Gender division of labour also leads to hierarchies and inequalities because men and women’s labour is not valued or rewarded equally. Even now, equal pay for equal work is not the norm in most countries; housework is unpaid; and women are the first to be fired when recession hits the workplace. The gender division of labour is not the same everywhere. It is specific to culture, location, and time. To challenge the gender division of labour in society means challenging what being a “man” and “woman” in a society entail.

The situation may not always be intolerable; but it is impossible to predict that it will not become so. –Clavdia von Werlhof

The gender division of labour is responsible for statistics like : Globally women hold only 14 per cent senior management positions (UNDP Human Development Report, 1995) ; the ratio between women’s salaries and men’s salaries in US continues to be 3:5 and this has not changed in the last one hundred years. Seventy per cent of the world’s poorest and illiterate people are women.

This data exactly show that what we thought of gender roles and what they really are. These are how the tactics work in this world. It is said that, “Woman’s place in the house, therefore women should be in the both houses of Parliament “.

In the conclusion, there is a need to focus on the positions women are placed in the society. Because women gives birth to a child and feed the child, it does not mean that the work of women is to nurture only. To assess the position we need to look at the social relations of gender or power relations between men and women. To improve women’s position the existing norms, structure and power relations between men and women have to be changed.

Refrences:- 1. Understanding Gender by Kamla Bhasin 2. Lerner Greda, 1986, The Creation of Patriarchy. gender-inequality-in-higher-education