ISSN (Print) - 0012-9976 | ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

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Information and Communication Technology and Female Labour Market Participation

Does information and communication technology adoption lead to any broad differences in women’s labour force participation behaviour in India? We use the India Human Development Survey to examine employment decisions of women and find that its adoption leads to improvement in employment measures only for urban women.

Women’s Contribution in the Rural Production Process

Women and Work in Rural India edited by Madhura Swaminathan, Shruti Nagbhushan and V K Ramachandran, New Delhi: Tulika Books, 2020; pp 380, `995.

Dinner on Tuesday

He wants to be a billionaire’s wife, he says, in his next life.

Taken care of. Without a care in the world. Sitting

across from me, giggling. Trying to get a rise. Face alive

The News Media Circus

There is a familiar pattern of reporting crimes against women. The pattern does not highlight the structural ways in which these crimes become more probable. Instead, it sensationalises the crimes, highlighting the individual case details in a manner of resounding middle-class families of the threats of Westernised modernity. The gruesome murder of Shraddha Walker has yet again laid bare the familiar patterns of news reporting violence against women. The underlying message of such reporting has implications of how women experience risk, choices and urban spaces in India. This article engages with the issue of news media reporting of violent crimes against women and discusses the larger implications of media framing for women and the society.

In Pursuit of Uniform-ity: The Hijab Row

Vol. 58, Issue No. 1, 07 Jan, 2023
The issue of the Hijab Ban holds several layers underneath it. On the surface, it appears that it is solely the case of students asking for amendments in the rulebook of "uniforms". Another angle is that of Women's dress (uniform in this case) which solicits the attention and control of the community and society. Furthermore, considering the current socio-political climate in India, one is bound not to ignore the possibility of the Islamophobic facet to the case of the Hijab Ban. Thus, a question that arises is how to make sense of the Hijab Ban? Is it a case of “School uniform”, “Women’s clothing”, or “Callous Islamophobia”?

The Invisibility of Women in Conflict Zones

This reading list examines women’s complex experience in conflict zones along with their potential to emerge as equal stakeholders in conflict zones for ensuring rehabilitation and mitigation. This analysis maps the risks and vulnerabilities it exposes them to, their experiences, how sexual offences are frequently trivialised in the volatile space that is a war zone, and more.

How COVID-19 Deepened the Gender Fault Lines in India’s Labour Markets

Vol. 57, Issue No. 51, 17 Dec, 2022
India has witnessed low levels of women’s labour force participation over the last four decades, with gaps of nearly 40 percentage points between the proportion of men and women in the labour force. Recent high-frequency data shows that COVID-19-induced lockdowns have had a disproportionate impact on women’s employment. Women bore the immediate impact of lockdowns, with 37.1% losing jobs (versus 27.7% men) in April 2020 and forming 73% of job losses in April 2021. Employment recovery has been slower for women. Prevailing sociocultural factors such as the increased burden of unpaid domestic work, gender digital divides, mobility restrictions, and the lack of institutional support at workplaces are discouraging women’s return to work. Even in January 2022, women’s labour force is 9.4% lower than January 2020 versus 1.6% for men. In this scenario, governments can support through gender-sensitive job-creation plans to expand women’s employment in the public and micro, small and medium enterprise sectors, and incentivise women’s entrepreneurship.

Do Female Lives Matter?

The rising cases of murder demand that murder as such should be considered a crime against women in India.

Revaluing Unpaid Work

The 2021 state assembly elections offered a unique and unexpected opportunity for the recognition of women’s unpaid domestic and care work through the promises of unconditional cash transfers. These cash transfers present feminists with a valuable opportunity to theorise the welfare state. This article uses primary data and in-depth interviews to evaluate one such scheme, namely the Orunodoi scheme in Assam.

Women-only!

While the repertoire of erotic performance of lavani has developed largely for male consumption, the recent emergence of women-only spectators of lavani is unusual and puzzling. How has lavani missed the moral outrage over the articulations of female sexual desire that pervades the public domain? This paper discusses how the possibilities for transgression of heteronormative desire in this phenomenon are complicated by caste and class divisions, the work–leisure binary, and the politics of the folk. It seeks to uncover the contested process of stigmatisation of lavani as vulgar and its simultaneous celebration as the folk which is embedded in the formation of lavani audiences.

Conservative Framing of the Hijab Issue and the Muslim Women’s Movement

Conservative and reactionary forces among Hindus and Muslims appear to be the major beneficiaries of the controversy over wearing hijab to schools. Such issues being the traps or detours laid by these forces, marginalised communities must choose their battlegrounds wisely. Instead of diverting the energy to the sectarian agenda of enforcing a dress code and perpetuating marginalisation, Muslim women’s movement should uphold the “Shaheen Bagh Spirit” of upholding constitutional values and unitedly fighting for rights and equality.

 

Entrepreneurship at the Grassroots

Taking the view that the official practice of clubbing medium, small, and microenterprises in one category is not sound, this study points out that these categories are substantially different from each other in terms of size, structure, resources, and business perspectives. Microenterprises, in particular, represent a different ecosystem whose nuances must be understood carefully so as to provide suitable inputs for an effective policy on them.

 

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