DEVELOPMENT: South Asian Women Discriminated Against Even Before Birth

By Thalif Deen Reprint | | Print |

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 15 2000 (IPS) - South Asian women face discrimination at birth – and even before they are born, says a new report published by a think-tank based in Pakistan.

Female foeticide and infanticide are manifestations of patriarchal structures where South Asian families traditionally prefer sons over daughters, according to the study by the Mahbub ul Haq Human Development Centre in Islamabad.

The late Mahbub ul Haq, a former finance minister of Pakistan and a senior official of the UN Development Programme (UNDP), was the architect of the annual Human Development Report published by the New York based UN agency.

The 219-page study says that South Asia has one of the most distorted sex ratios in the world – there are only 94 women for every 100 men compared with the global ratio of 106 women for every 100 men.

“The disparity in the two ratios implies that some 79 million women are missing in the region, through female infanticide, foeticide and inequitable feeding practices,” it adds.

In India, 18 percent more girls than boys die before their fifth birthday. In Maldives, female children are 51 percent more likely than males to die before their fifth birthday.

Further, South Asian women also face ingrained discrimination because the value of their labour is neither accounted for in official statistics nor appreciated by policy-makers. Women’s work, no matter how physically rigorous, mentally taxing, or emotionally draining, is considered to be a duty, undeserving of compensation. And South Asian women work at least 10 to 12 hours a day, while men on average work two to four hours less.

“Without active concern for these disparities and new efforts to empower women in decision-making bodies, there is little chance that these issues will be resolved,” says Khadija Haq, head of the Human Development Centre.

She says that the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing was widely hailed as a turning point in the global struggle for women’s rights. But while there was some progress in terms of developing national plans of action, very little – as far as meaningful gains for women – has been accomplished in South Asia since the landmark Beijing conference.

This is one of the conclusions of the study titled ‘Human Development in South Asia 2000’ which covers seven countries in the region: India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal and Maldives.

Women account for half the population of South Asia, yet they remain mostly invisible in all governing institutions.

Despite the fact that four out of seven South Asian countries – India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka – have had female heads of state and prime ministers, women’s representation in decision-making bodies remains low.

In 1999, female participation in South Asian parliaments was among the lowest in the world, with women comprising only two percent of Bhutan’s parliament and 2.6 percent of Pakistan’s parliament.

The study says that patriarchal attitudes and biases hamper women from voting or standing for election, and that many women have to stand as independent candidates, which reduces their chances of winning.

The majority of female civil servants are assigned to social sectors, such as health and education. However, few women, including those in the social sectors, are in policy and decision-making positions.

In Pakistan’s civil service, for example, there are only 19 female joint secretaries, as opposed to 800 men at the same level. In Bangladesh, despite a 10 percent quota for women in the civil services, less than eight percent of the posts are currently occupied by women.

The study also notes that only six percent of the judges in South Asia are women, with most female judges concentrated in the lower courts. India and Sri Lanka are the only South Asian countries to have women on their Supreme Court benches. Even in the lower courts, where most crimes are tried, women judges are few and unevenly scattered.

South Asia also has one of the world’s lowest female literacy rates 37 percent. Within the region, Pakistan and Nepal have female literacy rates of 25 and 21 percent respectively.

“During the last 20 years, significant progress has taken place in the state of education in South Asia, but gaps remain between the educational achievements of men and women, and of boys and girls,” the study notes.

For instance, more than two-thirds of South Asian out-of-primary school children are girls. Nearly two-fifths of girls enrolled in primary school drop out before grade 5.

Of the already low vocational education enrolment of less than two percent, female students comprise only a quarter of one percent. The mean number of years of schooling that most South Asian girls receive is less than 1.2 years, with girls in Bhutan receiving a mere 0.2 years of schooling.

In South Asia, women’s rights also continue to be violated despite constitutional guarantees of equality. Throughout the region, the enforcement of laws intended to protect or empower women is obstructed by cultural traditions, ignorance of the law, legal loopholes and inconsistencies, and a lack of will among enforcement agents and the judiciary.

The study also documents how the majority of South Asian women – regardless of class, caste or religion – face unequal access to property, protection from harm and decision-making powers.

The justice system itself is out of reach for most women, based on their low social status, lack of education, and limited public mobility, as well as on the discriminatory attitudes of police and the judiciary, according to the study.