Gender Disparity: Its Manifestations, Causes and Implications

6. As revealed from the state-wise survey in connection with the project Ghosh et al. (2007-09), in all the major cities of India, young girls are kept in bondage by powerful people against high rent for regular utilization among the moneyed and influential people of the society. See only one day’s report in The Times of India, Kolkata, India, February 11, 2008: “An Endless Cycle of Slavery: It’s a one way journey to hell. If being forced by parents into dancing isn’t enough, girls of 10 to 16 years age often fall prey to traffickers.” See also Menon-Sen and Shiva Kumar (2001).

7. Nobody knows how many people from Western countries and also from India is infected every month by availing the easy attraction of ‘sex tourism’ in Bangkok region.

8. Questions may be raised about ‘gender disparity’ vis-à-vis ‘male female disparity’. For example, in case of child labour, if a child is forced to work for wage under prevailing socio-economic conditions in any region, there is no logic whatsoever to distinguish between male versus female disparity as in both situations it is a vice against humanity. Note that we could not include this variable at the district level.

9. HDI does not represent differences between men and women, which is severe in the developing world. It does not generally adjust for within country inequality across regions too. Two other measures have therefore been introduced by UNO. Gender-related Development Index (GDI) measures achievements in the same dimensions and variables as in HDI, but it captures inequalities in human development between females and males. The greater the gender disparity in basic human development, the lower a country's GDI compared with its HDI. For every country, the GDI is lower than its HDI, implying that gender inequality still exists in every society (Bardhan and Klasen, 1999). Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) captures gender inequality in key areas of economic and political participation and decision-making. It tracks the percentage of women in parliament, women who are administrators and managers, professional and technical workers, and women's earned income share as a percentage of men's. Gender related development index (GDI) introduced in Human Development Report 1995 measures achievements in the same dimension using the same indicators as the HDI, but it captures the inequality between men and women. In a sense, it is HDI adjusted downward for gender inequality. UNDP methodology for calculating SRI includes income, education, health and social condition. But we have not followed the typical UNDP methodology due to lack of district level data with rural urban division. Moreover, we had to contend with a three-year forward lag for purchasing power, poverty and inequality at the district level, which have never been used so far. NSS sampling design for 61^st Round helped us to derive the district level economic indicators, which was not possible ever before.