The Silent Voters and their importance
Tags: Empowerment, Welfare, Women, Public Policy, Reform

The silent voters

The recently concluded Bihar elections proved one thing — the importance of the silent voters, who come from a section whose importance is often neglected. Who were these silent voters? The women of Bihar! Bihar saw better turnout and participation of women(around 60%) during elections than men(around 55%). There’s a reason why Nitish Kumar thanked this section in his victory speech. Many believe that the women of Bihar propelled the NDA to a win even though most exit polls predicted that MGB would get a landslide victory.

But why did women of Bihar vote for the NDA? Because unlike what a lot of educated and privileged women would like you to believe, in developing nations like India, women empowerment starts from the grassroots. Rural women can’t think about fancy issues, when their basic needs like health and sanitation aren’t fulfilled. Be it sanitary pads for Re. 1(a PM who talks about sanitary pads in I-Day speech! What a sanghi dude!!), or clean drinking water under AMRUT scheme, or LPG connections under PM Ujjwala scheme, or free electricity under PM Saubhagya scheme or toilets under Swachh Bharat, the NDA government has taken huge strides in improving the quality of life of women in Bihar. Even the Triple talaq bill played an important role in enticing the women who were victims of this practice!

But if we look at the bigger picture, we need to ask ourselves — is this enough? A concerning indicator for India has been the steady decline of women in the labour force over the years — from 37% in 2005 to around 26% in 2018. While a small part of this fall has been due to more women going for higher studies and self-employment, most of this can be attributed to socio-economic biases that still exists. A fast growing economy might mean improving household incomes, and in India, that might mean women being restricted to household chores. An estimate shows that with equal participation of women in labour force, India can gain around $700 billion by 2025 in economic value! That’s nearly 25% of our current GDP! There’s also a reason why a lot of the welfare schemes in India try to target women. Because women, in general, don’t use the money for drugs or gambling, but rather spend it for their household needs.

A widely proposed solution to solve the problems of women is to increase their participation and representation in politics. The Nordic countries, which are consistently ranked at the top in Human Development indices, have the highest average representation of women in their houses(around 42%). But the Indian approach of 33% reservation for women hasn’t worked out that well, and that’s primarily because it has been a top down approach rather than trying to develop women leaders at the grassroots. The practice of Pradhanpati(which has been jokingly portrayed in the famous comedy drama series called “Panchayat”), is the crude reality in most villages. In such cases, women merely occupy an ornamental position, while most of the campaigning and administrative work is carried out by Pradhanpatis.

When it comes to leadership or entrepreneurship, there are some great models that have worked quite well for women, and which can be emulated on a larger scale : —

a. Kudumbashree program in Kerala: I rarely believe that Communists have had any significant contribution to India’s development, but if I had to name a few, then the Kudumbashree model has worked wonders for women. Loosely influenced by Bangladesh’s concept of Grameen banks, it organizes poor women at the grass root level and enhances their socio-economic standing through micro-credits and women empowerment initiatives via vocational training, education and healthcare. Its innovative poverty reduction approach is implemented through local self-governments. The program has over 5 million women participants, and is one of the world’s largest women empowerment programs. It has produced a number of women leaders who have even found their way into the state assembly, and at the same time it has also given rise to contribution of women to Kerala’s economy through various cooperatives. It is one of the shining examples of how SHGs should work.

b. Amul model: In the highly competitive milk sector in India, Amul is now a household name when it comes to dairy products in India. A product of the White Revolution, Amul’s cooperative model helped it to survive in a sector where the supply market is extremely fragmented. Even foreign food and dairy giant, Danone, couldn’t compete with Amul in India. And women have played an extremely crucial role in Amul’s success. According to a report, the number of female cooperative members had increased from 0.22 million in 1981 to 3.7 million in 2008. Working at the ground level, women are the sole reasons for the success of this business model. And this has enabled the women of Gujarat to become economically independent and more involved in business and decision making.

The Modi government has multiple schemes which have higher percentage of women beneficiaries— like Standup India, Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojna (PMMY), Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), Atal Pension Yojana (APY), Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) and the Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY). Infact, Standup India scheme has 81% of registered women accounts. Most of these schemes are aimed at improving financial inclusion and support for neglected and poor sections of the society. It’s my firm belief that extending such support, coupled with wide-scale adaption of such successful models will go a long way in empowering the women of India!