Village Women, Not City Girls, Enjoy Power of Employment

November 5, 2003

MUMBAI (Nov. 5, 2003) - The percentage of employed women in India is

half that of employed men. However, this is more of an urban

phenomenon than a rural one. In rural India, 31% of the total female

population is employed as opposed to 11% in urban areas.

This shows certain positive trends in rural India and indicates some

not-so-positive signs for urban India. For one, it indicates a far

lesser gap between male and female employment in villages than in

urban India.

The percentage of employed males is more than 52% in villages —

indicating a gap of 21 percentage points between male and female

employment. In cities, where the employed male population is above

50%, the gap is more than 39 percentage points.

Also, this trend is indicative of the fact that the dependent

population in urban areas is far higher than in rural areas — as

borne out by the statistics. Dependants as a ratio of workers in

urban areas are almost twice the ratio observed in rural areas.

But these statistics cannot be taken completely at face value. At

least not without taking into consideration the primary occupation

in the country — agriculture.

Agriculture is understood as an occupation to which all hands in the

family contribute. Since agriculture is a seasonal activity, a

number of women work only during the sowing season and harvest

season. Thus while they get counted in the working population, they

are, to a large extent, remain marginal workers. A marginal worker

by definition is one who is engaged in productive activities for

less than six months in a year, as opposed to a main worker, who is

involved in productive work for more than six months a year.

Thus almost 45% of the rural working women are marginal workers.

In contrast, even though the percentage of working women to total

women in urban areas remains low, most of them are main workers. Of

the total working women in urban India, 79% are main workers, while

only 21% are marginal workers.

Source The Economic Times Online, Mumbai (Bombay), "Village Women,

Not City Girls, Enjoy Power of Employment" by Manika Premsingh

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