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IWWAGE-Institute for What Works to Advance Gender Equality

Women and Work: How India Fared in 2021

The year 2021 continued to challenge global recovery efforts, with the second wave of COVID-19 presenting new hurdles. Women and girls were disproportionately impacted, with structural barriers exacerbating the health crisis. As this report is compiled, the Omicron variant remains a threat, highlighting the need for a gender-responsive and equitable recovery.

To achieve this, we must design inclusive social safety nets, bridge the gender gap in access to technology, create hybrid work solutions, reduce and redistribute care work, and invest in the care economy. Collecting robust, sex-disaggregated data is crucial to ensure effective, scalable policies and solutions.

This report maps the ongoing efforts to bring women back into the workforce and prepare them for the future of work. It highlights key policy and programmatic developments that shaped women’s work in India in 2021. Additionally, the report looks ahead, emphasising new-age skills, entrepreneurship, and non-traditional livelihoods for a self-reliant India. It also sheds light on social indicators influencing women’s workforce participation, including access to resources, health, well-being, and security.

Innovations for Women’s Empowerment Collectives in Chhattisgarh

In partnership with the Chhattisgarh State Rural Livelihood Mission, LEAD at Krea University and IWWAGE are testing innovative digital solutions and institutional models to empower Women’s Empowerment Collectives (WECs). These pilots, supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, aim to strengthen women’s economic participation, access to government entitlements, and improve digital and social inclusion. One such initiative is the Haqdarshak program, which trains Self-Help Group (SHG) members to become community entrepreneurs-Haqdarshikas-who use a digital app to support citizens in accessing vital government documents and schemes. Over 5,000 women have been trained, resulting in nearly 3 lakh applications processed, many of which were done free of charge. Haqdarshikas have also earned supplementary incomes, while supporting their communities during COVID-19, including with vaccination appointments.

Other initiatives include *Mor Awaaz*, a phone-based service aimed at improving mobile usage and information access among women from SKY villages, and a digital intervention exploring how SHGs share information and maintain connections during the pandemic. Preliminary findings show that while COVID-19 negatively impacted SHG women’s livelihoods and mental health, strong social ties enabled them to remain resilient. Moving forward, efforts will focus on leveraging these networks for entrepreneurial training and sustainable income generation, such as group-based soap production supported through mobile-based learning. Together, these interventions highlight the power of digital tools and community-led models in advancing women’s empowerment in rural India.

Innovations for Women’s Empowerment Collectives in Chhattisgarh

IWWAGE and LEAD at Krea University, in partnership with Bihan and with support from the Gates Foundation, are testing digital and assisted models to strengthen Women’s Empowerment Collectives (WECs) in Chhattisgarh. These pilots include:

Haqdarshak: Training SHG women as digital agents (Haqdarshikas) to help communities access government entitlements, with over 2.9 lakh applications processed and income generated for agents.

Mor Awaaz: Encouraging mobile phone use among women in SKY villages through weekly information calls, aiming to shift gender norms and improve digital engagement.

Information Sharing in SHGs: Exploring how digital tools and social networks influence knowledge sharing and economic resilience, with planned training on soap-making and business skills for SHG women.

These initiatives aim to build digital capacity, promote economic inclusion, and strengthen community-based support systems for rural women.

Land Access, Productivity and Female Labour Force Participation

Access to land is critical for women’s economic empowerment and wellbeing. In developing countries, secure land rights for women improve household nutrition, children’s health, school enrolment, and increase women’s decision-making power. Studies from Pakistan, Nepal, Ethiopia, and Vietnam highlight these positive outcomes.

In India, despite legal reforms like the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, only 13.8% of women own agricultural land-and often without real control. Social norms, weak implementation, and lack of gender-disaggregated data continue to restrict women’s land ownership and access to benefits tied to it.

Efforts such as joint land titling, gender-inclusive policies, legal awareness, and improved data systems are essential for closing the gap. Secure land rights are not just about ownership-they are a pathway to equality, better livelihoods, and stronger communities.

Social Identities and Female Labour Force Participation in India

Caste remains one of the most entrenched forms of social stratification in South Asia, shaping access to opportunity, dignity, and mobility. The Asian Dalit Rights Foundation estimated in 2017 that 20-25% of the global population, particularly in South Asia, continues to face caste-based discrimination. Historically rooted in occupational divisions, caste has evolved into a rigid, inherited identity that restricts upward mobility, especially for those burdened with degrading and hazardous work like manual scavenging.

In India, the intersection of caste and gender creates compounded barriers for marginalised women. While gender inequality is widely acknowledged in the labour market, the additional layer of caste bias remains insufficiently explored. Women from Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) often face systemic exclusion in education, hiring, and wages, perpetuating economic and social inequalities. Despite constitutional safeguards and laws against untouchability, caste continues to influence labour outcomes-particularly for Dalit women-who remain underrepresented and disadvantaged in the workforce.

This brief seeks to surface evidence and disaggregated data to better understand how caste intersects with gender to shape labour force participation in India. By doing so, it highlights the urgent need for policy action that acknowledges caste-based exclusion as a persistent, structural barrier to equality.