This timely volume brings together the work of some of India’s leading feminist economists, historians, political scientists, journalists and anthropologists to investigate the contemporary situation of women in India. It focuses on four broad domains: the cultural, the social, the political and the economic. The writers argue that despite apparently positive indicators of progress in education and paid employment, women’s status has not improved. They point out that steadily falling sex ratios even show a growing bias against the female child. They elucidate the complex ways in which this is connected with the nature of India’s development processes and examine the hidden dynamics by which economic development has strengthened male-biased norms and values across all castes and classes in India. Further, they argue that these two processes are organically connected: worsening discrimination against females is the direct result of development trajectories in India. This book is thus an urgent call for action: it shows that there is no room for complacency. We need to give immediate attention to the powerful interests that collude in women’s worsening status in India.
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