Women are equal to men in all respects, they say. Then why they are perceived only as custodian of family or why women employees are discriminated against in any organisation or why many of them are sexually harassed at workplaces? These were some of the questions debated during the second day of Doctoral Colloquium – 2013, at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA), on Tuesday.
Prof Ajeet Mathur from the IIMA chaired the session on Gender sensitisation and creation of women centric workplace, while Prof Ujvala Rajadhyaksha from Saint Mary’s College in Norte Dame, IIMA’s Prof Manjari Singh, executive director of Catalyst India WRC Sachi Irde and retired IAS officer Gauri Trivedi shared their experiences. The distinguished speakers also discussed lack of maternity leave, discrimination in wages to women in government schemes, apart from sexual harassment at workplace.
Raising the issue of lack of maternity leave for students pursuing research, a female participant said: “Working women, including research scholars, need a break from active work when they want to go the family way but there is no provision,” she lamented. Former IAS officer Gauri Trivedi said women IAS officials were mostly posted in social sectors and were considered incapable of handling key sectors like rural development, industry, finance, commerce etc. Many bright women professionals fail to reach at the top because of discrimination.
As per estimate, only 4.5% women sustain their careers successfully to grab the top portfolios. “It is interesting to see how government forms policies but lacks insight into it. For example, scheme like MNREGA is indeed good but there also we see discrimination in pay scales. Men are paid higher than women. Men get Rs150 to Rs180 a day while women are paid Rs100-Rs120 even though they do the same amount of work,” she said. The officer suggested that life of women who opted for a career in politics or bureaucracy should be a topic of research as they face many hurdles while pursuing such professions.
Changing social structure in the context of women was also discussed at the meet. In the traditional Indian set up men generally consider that besides working and earning it is also the responsibility of the women to look after family and children, depicting male chauvinism, the experts felt.
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