Our gender gap in contraception needs public policy intervention

 The recently-released fifth round of our National Family and Health Survey (NFHS-5) highlights that there has been a more than 10 percentage-point increase in the use of contraception among currently married women aged 15-49 years: that is, from 53.5% in 2015-16 to 66.7% in 2019-20. A significant jump has been observed in the use of condoms, which rose from 5.6% to 9.5%. It’s noteworthy that despite the near doubling in the use of condoms, female sterilization continues to be the most popular choice, with an adoption rate of 37.9% (NFHS-5), even many years after the inception of family planning as a concept in India

This brings forth a glaring gender divide in the methods of contraception used in India. The divide could imply two things. First, it may indicate greater bodily autonomy exercised by women today; in charge of their own lives and bodies, women could be making their own contraception choices, thereby determining when and how they want to plan their children and careers. Alternatively, this divide could also indicate the deep-rooted patriarchy that exploits and subjugates women. To evaluate which of the two are at work, we need to take a diligent look at our data

According to the NFHS-4, conducted during 2015-16, only about 8% of women were found to make independent decisions on the use of contraception, while for nearly every tenth woman, it was the husband who decided contraception use. The irony is that while it is husbands who decide the method, the actual burden of it falls on women. Ipso facto, female sterilization is the most wide-spread method, with more than a third of India’s sexually-active population opting for it, despite the lower cost and safer procedure of male vasectomy. Interestingly, based on data from NFHS-3 and NFHS-4, we also observe that a higher proportion of women with college or higher levels of education tend to opt for male or female reversible methods of contraception (33.7%) over female sterilization (17.2%). All these facts give credence to the ‘subjugation’ explanation of the divide over the ‘bodily autonomy’ hypothesis outlined above.

These observations have also been highlighted in a recent study published as a working paper by O.P. Jindal Global University in 2021, titled Gender Gap in the Use of Contraception: Evidence from India. The study lends evidence to the pertinent role that women’s education plays in the choice of contraception. The Bihar model is an excellent illustration of this, with the Population Council of India’s director Niranjan Saggurti cited as saying, “The most significant [factor] in the Bihar case is the increase in education—which has translated into increased use of contraception and increased family planning."

Therefore, in addition to educating children, there is an imperative to impart knowledge about the use and benefits of different methods of contraception to the community at large. It is paramount to target such awareness campaigns at both men and women. Special emphasis should be given to convincing men about the relevance of family planning, and hence, the use of several male contraceptive methods that are safer, cheaper and procedurally simpler than female sterilization. This can be done by utilizing the country’s existing network of community health workers, like Asha workers or Anganwaadi workers or Auxiliary Nurse Midwives. However, currently, most of these frontline workers who have the mandate to disseminate information on family planning are females. Additional male workers could also be deployed to ease direct communication with men.

Additionally, India conspicuously has no law on contraception that makes access to a sound sexual health our legal right, despite it being one of the key indicator variables of the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations (SDG indicator 3.7.1). Inclusion of sexual well-being as our legal right under the ambit of law can ensure that there are no unnecessary restrictions on the advertisement and publicity of contraceptives, thus easing people’s access to information and knowledge on them. Further, such a law could also be used to make the availability and accessibility of contraceptives easier by enrolling the services of Primary Health Centres, particularly to improve access in small towns, peri-urban and in rural areas.

With the introduction of a bill to amend the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, so as to increase the legal age at marriage of girls from 18 to 21 years, the government has taken a step in the right direction. There exists literature that suggests that an increase in the age of marriage for females reduces the total fertility of women (Maitra, 2004). While this would be a relatively direct result of a higher age of marriage, as it simply reduces the reproductive years of married women, a probable indirect consequence of this move could be an improvement in the bargaining power of women, as it may reduce age gaps between husbands and wives.

Further, exceptional pandemic measures like lockdowns and the exigencies of essential supplies have interrupted contraceptive supply chains. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), family planning has been severely affected during this period, with seven out of ten countries affected. According to United Nations Population Fund, of 114 low/middle-income countries, more than 47 million women were unable to access contraceptives. India alone, as per the report Resilience, Adaptation and Action: MSI’s Response to Covid-19, witnessed 650,000 unwanted pregnancies during the covid pandemic.

Therefore, it is a need of the hour that sexual and reproductive health become a priority at the policy level. Fostering better informed and healthier reproductive behaviour among the country’s masses is a long-term endeavour that should not cease on account of a health emergency.

Sonal Dua, Aditi Singhal & Divya Gupta are assistant professors, O.P. Jindal Global University

Source: Mintepaper, 16/02/22

Sexual violence in rural India draws on hierarchies of land, caste, patriarchy

 

Hierarchies of caste, class, and gender intersect to form a cocktail of horrors for the women of rural India — we must understand these nuances in order to form any policy that meaningfully tackles gender-based violence in India.

Since the Bhanwari Devi rape case in 1992 and the Khairlanji rape and massacre in 2006 to the Hathras case in 2020, successive Central and state governments have failed to address sexual violence as the multi-dimensional issue that it is. Hierarchies of caste, class, and gender intersect to form a cocktail of horrors for the women of rural India — we must understand these nuances in order to form any policy that meaningfully tackles gender-based violence in India.

Caste is the fault line that runs through rural India, the parts I call home. My constituency is in the rural and agrarian district of Ambedkar Nagar, with parts that lie in its much more famous neighbour, Ayodhya. I grew up in the Ambedkar Nagar (then part of Faizabad district) of the 1980s, where gunda raj was the only raj. A lot of that has changed now, due, in part, to an increased police presence and a steady urbanisation of people’s aspirations. But what has remained constant is rural India’s obsession with the caste order. This is how society has functioned for millennia: The lower castes have served the upper castes as potters, labourers, masons and cleaners, while the upper castes work to keep the status quo, adopting a few lower-caste families along the way as serfs in the world’s oldest feudal system.

In the political economy of post-Independence India, land is the currency that reigns supreme in the hinterlands. Land is class, power and honour. Its exclusive ownership is the basis of maintaining the caste order. The dominant castes in a particular region have traditionally been the largest landowners, and the benefits of the Green Revolution and the neo-liberal economic order have disproportionately benefited them and seldom the landless labourers who belong overwhelmingly to the lower castes.

But the post-Independence politics of Bahujan-Dalit mobilisation began challenging these ancient hierarchies. The reservation guaranteed by Babasaheb Ambedkar witnessed an emergence of a politically and economically influential sub-caste of Dalits in each state of the country. With the advent of Bahujan politics in Uttar Pradesh, oppressed castes found themselves represented in positions of power. This was an affront to the existing order. As a highly coveted resource, land is a flashpoint of conflict: In the Khairlanji rape and massacre, the upper castes retaliated brutally and bestially against the Bhotmanges, a Scheduled Caste family in the village, after the Bhotmanges filed a police complaint in In traditionally patriarchal societies, women are the currency of honour. A family’s, a community’s, a caste’s honour is inextricably tied to the “honour” of their female members — their purity, their morality, their chastity. Sexual violence operates on the nexus of land, caste, and patriarchy. It becomes a tool to maintain the status quo of land and caste. Sexual violence against women from lower caste communities is seldom about the individual woman; more often than not, it is about robbing the honour of a community, a caste, a family.

In the war of land and caste, women are both collateral and weapons. During land disputes between two caste groups with a large differential of power and influence, women’s bodies become collateral damage. But there is a different dynamic in conflicts among caste groups who are relatively close together in the caste (and class) order. When strongmen from one group pay a threatening visit to the property of another group, the defending group will bring their women out of the home, making them stand with the men. This is a deterring tactic — if threatened or harmed by the strongmen, a woman’s complaint warrants Section 354 of the Indian Penal Code (outraging the modesty of a woman).

That police officials often fall in favour with the dominant caste groups has been much discussed. But it is because SHOs and SPs are under pressure from the administration to not register sexual crimes under their jurisdiction, since these cases make them targets for transfers and dismissals. This fear of bureaucratic reprisal sets the apathetic tone for investigations as well. The retaliatory cases of violence against women that are registered after land conflicts make it harder for genuine cases of sexual assault to get their due process.

Any attempt to tackle this situation can’t focus on police reform, caste discrimination, patriarchy and reforms in land ownership alone. We must take an intersectional approach that targets all of the issues. Land ownership reform must tackle the irregularities of demarcation and the lack of proper records. Sound policy involving all stakeholders should also tackle the illegal constructions on abadi land and banjar zameen. The goal of annihilating caste cannot be achieved without mammoth efforts in educational, professional, and social integration of lower castes into every field, be it healthcare, judiciary, education, entertainment, or sports.

In tandem with land and caste reforms, we must tackle the persistence of patriarchy in our society. “Women’s empowerment” is a buzz phrase for political and corporate organisations, but we must view these promises with a critical eye: In the last few central budgets, the Ministry of Women & Child Development has under-utilised its funds for multiple programmes aimed at women’s empowerment. We must demand more representation of women in positions of power — be it through reserved seats in MP, MLA, and MLC elections, or the judiciary and corporate boards. We must work for quality sexual education and consent training for our youth, with the aim of not just preventing sexual assault but also equalising and normalising healthy relations among members of different genders and sexes. And lastly, we must bridge the gender divide in access to the transformative and emancipatory power of consumer technology.relation to a land dispute.

Written by Ritesh Pandey

Source: Indian Express, 4/01/21

Sep 12 2014 : The Economic Times (Bangalore)

How Many Minutes do You Work at Home?





Patriarchy shows up not only in the frequency of violent crimes such as rape, dowry-killing and acid attacks but also in more anaemic statistics, such as the gender-wise time spent on household chores. American men do a fair share of household work, while Indian men expect their wives to do it all.That is the key message from an OECD survey earlier this year. Domestic work is unpaid work. Indian men spend just about 19 minutes every day on domestic work compared to 161 minutes by their peers in the US, and a rich-country average of 139 minutes. Indian women spend about 352 minutes a day on household chores compared to 248 minutes by their counterparts in the US. True, the findings, based on National TimeUse Surveys, are not strictly comparable, given that the data for India is based on CSO’s survey way back in 1999, but are still useful in designing public policy.
Unpaid and invisible household work is often foisted on women in India, particularly for those at the lower income levels.
The CSO survey had a pointer. It showed that men in India dedicated themselves to “talking, gossiping and quarrelling”, surprisingly categorised under “personal care and self-maintenance”, spending almost eight hours in a week on this activity. Rural women also have tougher chores such as carrying water, collecting and carrying firewood or processing food stuff by hand. It raises the physical intensity of their work, not captured in the time-use surveys.
Fewer women do paid work today. Data show a decline in female workforce participation at an annual rate of 1.72% between 2004-05 and 2009-10. To bring more women into the workforce, we need to understand their problems in balancing their work-life responsibilities. Surely, men, and not just paid help, can take on a larger share of domestic chores.