Saturday, January 16, 2010

Gender Inequality In India..


India has always been a victim of gender inequality, if we go by statistics, The World Economic Forum Gender Gap Index 2007 ranked India at the 114th position. In 2008, situation remained same with 113rd rank. Rank is calculated based on economic, political, educational and health parities among 134 countries. Surprisingly, in 2009ranking, Iceland stood 1st surpassing all other Nations whereas India struggled to stick to 114th.

We Indians often talk about Naina Lal Kidwai of HSBC India and ICICI’s Chanda Kocher, Indira Nooyi. However study shows that not more than 4% women occupy senior level positions and only 1% organization have women CEO.

Today, I read that Multinational Corporations (MNC) is inclined to hire women for the top jobs. They want to infuse gender diversity. However, it is also mandatory to be competitive in global market. Multinational Corporations (MNCs) must diversify their workforce in the international arena. This diversification, to be meaningful, must extend across both gender and cultural boundaries. With the increasing inclination of fairer sex towards MNC’s, it is the best time to leverage on that.

Corporations find it lucrative and advantageous as women attrition rate has always been low as compared to male counterparts. Women prefer to be stable and attach value to the work they do. Apart from that, MNC considers them to be good communicator and negotiator.

However, the problem persists because of lack of higher education opportunities’ for women in the male dominated country, India. Another blockage is the mindset of women towards career. They are always at the crossroads of family and career.

Step taken by MNC’s may prove to be a boon towards bridging the gap of gender inequality and hopefully place India in top 50 in the coming years in Gender Gap Index.
Keep your fingers crossed!