An unfair analysis

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Indians take justifiable pride in the advances which their women have made in all walks of life, an indication of which can be seen as several Indian women occupy top political positions. This is unsurprising, because women played an important part in the independence movement and thereafter, in political life. Indian universities have large female enrolments in both the humanities and the sciences. It is common to find female doctors in India and there are world class scientists amongst Indian women. There are some well-known Indian women writers which is attributable to the fact that women in India have the freedom to learn and to express themselves. This is not the case in many other countries. Women play an important role in India’s film industry.

Despite the achievements of Indian women, the Global Gender Gap Report (2009), published by the World Economic Forum (Geneva, Switzerland), denigrates India by ranking it at a lowly 114 (below Bangladesh at 94 and Nepal at 110) out of 134 countries. As has become habitual for such global reports, selfappointed international ranking agencies place Scandinavian countries at the top: Iceland 1, Finland 2 and Norway 3. Scandinavian countries seemed to be perceived as the model for both development and female advancement.

NOEL G DE SOUZA comments on the Global Gender Gap report, which blatantly ignores achievements by Indian women farming system without there being a quantification of their economic share. Such is the case with India and Southeast Asia. Then again, what about an Indian family where an educated woman stays at home to look after young children; does she not make an economic contribution which is not quantifiable? Perhaps in countries like those of Scandinavia she might be given income support which is counted in the report.

Health and survival: the gap between male and female life expectancy is taken into account as per WHO statistics; however, good health is then surmised by considering such unmeasurable or controversial data as “years lost to violence, disease, malnutrition or other relevant factors.” How does one assess this extended and open-ended list for a population which exceeds a billion?

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Australia comes at number 20 and incredibly the Philippines at number 9, whilst Sri Lanka does well at number 16 ranking ahead of the UK at 15 and the United States at 31. The high ranks accorded to the Philippines and to Sri Lanka may be explained by the report’s assertion that “the Index is constructed to rank countries on their gender gaps, not on their development level.” Yet in most cases developed countries rank high.

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Another baffling factor is then added which is that of “missing women” where it says there exists a “strong son preference”.

…the gap between male and female life expectancy is taken into account as per WHO statistics; however, good health is then surmised by considering such unmeasurable or controversial data as “years lost to violence, disease, malnutrition or other relevant factors

The report judges educational attainment on female-to-male ratios in primary, secondary and tertiary education. It says nothing about the number of doctors, scientists and women graduates that a country like India produces. In the case of India, the numbers are staggering. However, when things are considered percentage wise, these achievements get masked and give the wrong impression that women in India are faring very badly indeed.

India, the report acknowledges, has 40% women teachers in tertiary education. This is quite good given that the UK has 41% and the USA has 45%. In contrast Bangladesh has 18% yet it ranks higher to India in “educational attainment”105 versus 121!

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The report focuses on four pillars: (1) economic participation and opportunity, (2) educational attainment, (3) health and survival and (4) political empowerment. India has very low rankings for the first three indicators, dubiously coming last for health and survival in the entire world, despite its increasing life expectancy. However, India excels in the case of political empowerment, being ranked 24. Economic participation is judged on remuneration and the possibility of advancement. These are obviously good criteria for a modern society. But the world is being judged in this report by Western yardsticks which explains why Scandinavian countries fare so well in these rankings. What about the economic participation of women in peasant farms?

In agricultural family holdings women participate in all the components of the

Females account for a healthy 44% of India’s primary teachers and 34% of secondary reachers. There is no doubt that in India’s rural areas girls from disadvantaged groups need provision of educational skills to girls. The Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya project and the Mahila Samakhya Programme are examples of successful initiatives. India has no cultural impediment that restricts education for girls.

The report seeks to quantify certain sorts of data such as “paternal versus maternal authority” which is an item bordering on the esoteric. How can one investigate and quantify such an indicator for millions of people?

The World Economic Forum claims to be “independent” and “impartial”, saying that it is “committed to improving the state of the world by engaging leaders in partnerships to shape global, regional and industry agendas.” Given the nature of its report on India, one wonders how this could be possible.