Recently, The New Education Policy 2020, has been approved by the government of India and is a commendable step taken to achieve the goal of providing quality education and having a skillful, talented, and professional youth population. It will certainly be a landmark in the history of education in India, step taken after wide ranging consultations. Here, I must commend the TSR Subramanian Committee in 2016 and the K Kasturirangan Committee for having done a stellar work.
The policy is a welcome emphasis on a holistic and flexible system that seeks to transform India into a lively knowledge society. There are many welcoming steps like online learning and digital courses. I note with great satisfaction that one of its loftier goals is to establish Multidisciplinary Educational and Research Universities (also called MERUs) having the same status as IITs, IIMs, as prototypes of the multidisciplinary education of global standards in the country. Moreover, the National Research Foundation will be created as an apex body for fostering a strong research culture capacity across higher education. However, the policy did not break any silence on the gender disparities in the field of education, especially science.
Background
In 2003, the Indian National Science Academy in New Delhi set up a committee to look at the status of women scientists in India. At the same time, the Indian Academy of Sciences in Bangalore, also set up a panel on women in science with similar objectives. Since 1999, Indian women physicists had started participating in international initiatives to bring women forward together. Much earlier than that, in 1973, the Indian Women Scientists Association (IWSA) was established in Mumbai. In December 2005 India's Ministry of Science and Technology constituted a task force on women in science. The primary function was to suggest suitable measures which would eventually help in bringing in gender equality and preventing the loss of woman power and encourage women to take up science as a career. Unfortunately, these efforts are seem to be unsuccessful to promote the cause of women in science.
As per the report published in National Task Force on women in science, only 15 percent of the Indian research and development workforce are women, while the global average is 30 percent. However, the magnitude of gender difference in science is quite significant in India. Very small percentages of women who do pursue science later convert it into a career. Unfortunately, we can see many women around us, having engineering or PhD degrees in science, who did not pursue it any further. However, Information Technology and teaching professionals (mainly biological sciences) at school or under-graduate level are few of the sectors that are utilizing women’s talent effectively. The crisis can be even traced at the foundation stage, by which I intend to say that the number of institutions offering arts and commerce outnumber those offering science and when it comes to women’s college the difference becomes significantly larger. This arises a need for greater investment. In fact, at meetings like Indian Science Congress, women rarely deliver public lectures or involved in any panel discussions. They are either participant in young researchers submitting posters or a few giving lectures in sectional meetings.
Reasons
There are a variety of proposed reasons for the relatively low numbers of women in scientific world. I would like to classify them broadly into two main categories: Psychological and social. Psychology says that men prefer working with things, while women prefer working with people. Men have stronger realistic and investigative interests, and women show the stronger artistic, social, and conventional interests. And this leads to the stereotypical threat for women to put their legs into science. Socially, Indian women are discriminated and less privileged as compared to their counterparts. The birth and education of a girl child has never been accepted for decades. In Indian patriarchal society, women are expected to perform a supportive, subordinate role to the man in the family with the prime responsibility of a nurturer and caretaker, and not as a wage-earner. A daughter may not be welcome in every family as reflected by the Census 2011, Gender ratio of India is 943 females per 1000 males. Only few girls could enable to achieve higher education, combating the barriers. Unfortunately, they may leave due to not being invited to professional meetings, the use of sexually discriminating standards against women, inflexible working conditions, the perceived need to hide pregnancies, and the struggle to balance family and work.
Lack of Role Model
Lack of role models is another important factor which makes them hesitate to build their career in science and technology. When it comes to the role model in Science, we all remember the priceless contribution of greats such as Sir C V Raman, Meghnad Saha, Dr. S. N.Bose, Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam and many more. However, we could hardly recollect any women names, other than, Kalpana chawla and Asima Chatterjee.
The Queen Bee effect
In addition, the Queen Bee effect also contributes to the sluggish progression of women in scientific field. This concept only applies to women. It explains why higher-status women, particularly in male-dominated professions, may actually be far less likely to help other women than their male colleagues might be. While men network welcomes other men quite easily, women do not. Women in high positions rarely groom other women. To recall my personal experiences, while applying for higher studies in botany, I received several positive responses from male supervisors in India and abroad seeking invitation for my PhD studies. Unfortunately, not a single such request came from any woman scientist, I had to coax some of them to accept.
Way forwards
Various programs for women scientists, like GATI and VIGYAN JYOTI, by the DST (under the DISHA program) have been introduced with a view, to provide an enabling and supportive framework for gender mainstreaming of women in science, technology and innovation. There is also S&T portal for women, providing the collective knowledge regarding the government schemes, scholarships and fellowships for women. We need to utilize such programs and facilities to build confidence and encouraging girls to pursue their scientific career without any hesitation and discriminations. The Government of India needs to take concrete steps to implement the recommendations of the 2013 National Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (STIP) that has gender parity as a stipulated goal. We need to showcase the contributions of women scientists in the country and to change people’s mindset that women are less suited for science. At the same time, it is also important to deliberate on how science and technology can empower women. We need to understand the reasons for the loss of trained female scientists from scientific manpower in India and step towards minimizing the gender gap in professional attainment among scientists. We should also have to identify strategies and provisions to promote entry and to retain them in Science by analyzing the effectiveness of policies and practices already in place. As one of the famous saying that “men and women are the same chariot to carry the whole forward”. Equal contribution of women in the field of science and technology is also crucial for any community or country or society to be developed.
(The author is PhD student, Area of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 1-1 Asahidai, Nomi, Ishikawa 923-1292, Japan; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)