Gender Inequality in 21st Century

Shonima Malhotra
As has been quoted by PitrimSorokin,”Unstratified society with real equality of its members is a myth that has never been realized in the history of mankind.” Social stratification results to social inequality. Every society has unequal distribution of resources – wealth, or property, power and prestige among its members. Notably this inequality is not merely a matter of individual abilities and aptitudes but socially created inequalities. A society becomes unequal for a variety of factors, for example age, gender, caste, inheritance of property etc.
Gender refers to the socially constructed roles and behaviors that a society typically associates with males and females. It concerns the psychological, social and cultural differences between males and females.
Social inequality in the distribution of various rewards or desired goods and services manifests itself in a country like India strongly through differences of gender. In fact, gender inequality has been a social issue in India for centuries. It is hard to imagine this state of affairs in the 21st century when women have proved to be strong leaders in every field possible. But inspite of such progress, even today, the girl child is discriminated against in the society.
The cultural construct of Indian society which reinforces gender bias has led to the continuation of India’s strong preference for male children. In the Indian social context even today male children are preferred to female children. It is a known fact that this discrimination starts even before the girl child is born. An expected woman is always given the blessings to have a male child. This male preference has led to the abuse of advanced technology. The sophisticated scanning and supersonographic equipments are being misused to find out the sex of the child; that is to go for abortion if the child is found to be an unwanted female. Even among the educated, urban, well-to-do people, advanced medical technology such as aminocentesis and supersonography are used and if the foetus is found to be female, abortion is induced. The practice of female foeticide through sex selective abortion continues to be practiced in spite of the Prenatal Diagnostic Technique Act of 1994.
This discrimination does not end at this stage but can be seen prevalent at different stages and in different aspects throughout life. Discrimination and distinction between male and female children is made in matters relating to socialization, food, dress, health, education, domestic work, official work etc.
The members of the society treat boys and girls differently and as such are provided with unequal opportunities in different spheres of life. It is seen that both male and female children are exposed to traditional masculine and feminine traits and activities from the very childhood through the process of socialization. Boys are socialized to think that they should be invulnerable, fearless, decisive and even emotionless in some situation and are expected to be actively engaged in some good job, confident, courageous, responsible, respectful and be very competitive. They are expected to play with trucks, blocks and toy solider and are made to play tough games like cricket, football, basketball and hence make them masculine. Girls, on the other hand, are expected to be very affectionate, mild, gentle, pleasing, shy, tolerant, obedient, loyal, dutiful, hospitable, service-minded, loving, more committed to family than to their personal career, and so on. They are socialized to play all the indoor games and made to do soft jobs. They are given dolls and kitchen goods to play, because, according to society, these things make them soft, emotional, sweet and submissive- all marks of being feminine.
This disparity not remaining restricted till here extends to other sectors also such as educational sector, professional sector and property sector.
Education is not equally attained by Indian women. If a choice has to be made between sending a boy or a girl to school, the boy will usually be given precedence. Although literacy rates are increasing, the female literacy rate lags behind the male literacy rate. An underlying reason for such low literacy rates are parents’ perceptions that education for girls are a waste of resources as their daughters would eventually get married and live with their husbands’ families.’ Educating a girl is like nurturing a plant in someone else’s garden’ – this saying very aptly explains this perspective held by some parents regarding the education of their girl child. Traditional division of labour (more likely to have to work in the home, care for siblings etc) further disadvantages girls. In such a scenario, it is but obvious that for myriad reasons, many girls across the country are forced to drop out of school. It is found that girls are being discouraged to go for higher education and also for professional and technical education. Academic courses and sports activities which the students opt for in educational institutions are distinctly gender- segregated. No doubt, this trend is reversing in the past few years with both sons and daughter’s being sent to good educational institutions (this is, of course, also linked to economic prosperity and being able to afford quality schools for all children), but still much needs to be changed to enhance the literacy rate amongst girls and to provide them an opportunity to select their choice based subjects in academic field.
Though women constitute an important labour force in the country, there is a gender based division in the professional field too. Women are discriminated with regard to recruitment, promotion, increment, training, over-time allowance, facilities at work place, and so on. Male workers are given preference in these matters. There are also sufficient instances of exploitation of female workers in even in the organised and unorganised sectors. And to add to this they have to shoulder the burden of performing dual role responsibility of managing their homes and offices too.
Though women have equal rights under the law to own property and receive equal inheritance rights, but in practice women are at a disadvantage. Women are not only subject to income or asset inequality but also in terms of freedom and power deprivation of women goes beyond one’s imagination.
In the present progressive society, gender inequality, though reduced to a certain extent, has not been totally wiped out from the minds of the people. Different gender roles are still propogated through different agencies of society like family, education, media etc.
In fact, in addition to the early prevalent forms of gender bias, certain new forms of gender inequality have cropped up and gained momentum in the society. Rape, dowry murders, cybers talking are some of the examples reflecting these new variants of gender disparities and differences. In the ancient times atleast girls and women were safe to move outside without any fear and apprehensions. But is it possible in the present scenario? Cases like Nirbhaya are an answer to this question. Males on the other hand can still move out even at late nights without any fear and restrictions as before. Dowry deaths and murders have become a common news. But do we ever hear of any male being tortured for dowry? Why is this a practice applicable to girls and their families only and that too in times when the girls are also highly educated and well employed. As if this was not sufficient now a days digital technology too is being used to torture, blackmail and harm females in varied ways.
Can this be called a state of gender equality? I don’t think so. Simply providing equal fundamental rights to both the genders is not enough. There is a dire need to introduce practical changes. We cannot think of a sustainable future unless we initiate the necessary changes and build a strong and sustainable present. So lets come together and take the essential steps to generate a gender balanced rather than gender biased Indian society Let’s join hands to do away with the concepts of patriarchy and matriarchy and encourage a gender secular society.
(The author is Assistant Professor of Sociology GDC, Sidhra)

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