Eleventh Five Year Plan

188 Eleventh Five Year Planvulnerable to getting infected, but when they are foundpositive they face much greater discrimination thantheir male counterparts.EDUCATION6.17 The growth rate for female literacy in the lastdecade has been 3% higher than the growth rate formale literacy resulting in a decline in the absolute numbersof illiterate women—from 200.7 million in 1991to 190 million in 2001. Gender differential in education,however, continues to be high at 21.7%. This canbe attributed to a number of factors—lack of accessto schools, lack of toilets and drinking water, parentsfeeling insecure about sending girl children, poor qualityof education in government schools, and high feescharged by the private ones. Also with increasing feminizationof agriculture, the pressure of looking afteryounger siblings, collecting cooking fuel, water andmaintaining the household, all fall upon the girl child,putting a stop to her education and development.WORK AND EMPLOYMENT6.18 Entrenched patriarchal norms and customsmean that women’s work goes unnoticed and is unpaidfor. The double burden of work placed on her(unrecognized household work and low pay in recognizedwork) coupled with social norms that preventher from getting the requisite educational and technicalskills result in a low female work participation rate,either real or statistical. Female workforce participationrate in India was 28% (2004) as compared to otherdeveloping nations like Sri Lanka (30%), Bangladesh(37%), and South Africa (38%). 6 As per NSSO, however,(Table 6.1) work participation rate for femalein rural areas has increased from 28.7% in 2000–01to 32.7% in 2004–05, whereas in urban areas it hasincreased from 14% in 2000–01 to 16.6% in 2004–05.The work participation rate remains lower for womenthan for men both in rural and urban areas.6.19 A sectoral breakdown of women workers revealsthat 32.9% are cultivators, 38.9% agricultural labourers(as against 20.9% men) and 6.5% workers inthe household industry. 7 Much of the increase inemployment among women has been in the form ofself-employment; 48% of urban and 64% of ruralwomen workers describe themselves as ‘self-employed’. 8The Tenth Plan has, however, seen a welcome increasein the share of regular employment among femaleworkers in urban India.TABLE 6.1Work Participation Rates by Sex (1972 to 2005)(in %)Year Rural UrbanFemale Male Female Male1972–73 31.8 54.5 13.4 50.11987–88 32.3 53.9 15.2 50.61996–97 29.1 55.0 13.1 52.12000–01 28.7 54.4 14.0 53.12004–05 32.7 54.6 16.6 54.9Source: NSSO.6.20 As in the case of education, women’s employmentcharacterization differs across communities. TheSachar Committee Report shows that work participationrate among Muslim women is 25%, and as low as18% in urban areas. A larger proportion (73%) ofMuslim women is self-employed compared to 55%Hindu women. A much smaller proportion of SC/STwomen are self-employed; 45% of SC/ST women arecasual workers compared to around 20% Muslim and15% of upper caste Hindu women.6.21 Another worrying fact is that despite a slightincrease in employment, the average earning forrural women has declined between 1999–2000 and2004–05. This decline is more pronounced amongpoorer women, that is, illiterate women and womenwho have dropped out of primary, secondary, or highersecondary (see Table 6.2). The average wage for menhas, on the other hand, shown an increase across allcategories, leading to a widening of the wage disparityratio (ratio of female wage/male wage) from 0.89in 1999–2000 to 0.59 in 2004–05 for rural and 0.83in 1999–2000 and 0.75 in 2004–05 in urban areas, forall categories.6Gender Statistics, World Bank 2004.7Census of India 2001.8NSSO 2004–05.