Gender, Religion and Caste

Women are discriminated against in many aspects of life in India:

- Education: the literacy rate among women is lower than among men, and fewer girls go for higher studies.
- Work: women do a lot of work, but much of it is unpaid and invisible because household work is not valued.
- Wages and jobs: women are paid less than men even for the same work, and their share in highly paid jobs is very small.
- Political life: women’s participation in public life and politics is still low.
- Family and personal life: in many families, parents spend more on boys’ education than on girls’ education.
- Safety and violence: women face harassment, exploitation, domestic violence, and insecurity in public places and at home.
- Pre-birth discrimination: in some places, girl children are aborted before birth, leading to a low child sex ratio.

Communal politics takes several forms:

- Everyday communal beliefs: prejudices, stereotypes, and the idea that one religion is superior to others.
*Example:* cracking jokes or spreading stereotypes about people of another religion.
- Quest for political dominance: one community tries to dominate others.
*Example:* majoritarian dominance by the majority community.
- Political mobilisation on religious lines: using religious symbols, leaders, and emotions to gather support.
*Example:* appealing to voters in the name of a particular religion during elections.
- Communal violence: riots and massacres based on religion.
*Example:* the communal riots at the time of Partition in India and Pakistan.

Caste inequalities are still continuing in India because:

- Marriage remains caste-based: most people still marry within their own caste or tribe.
- Untouchability has not completely ended: despite being banned, it still exists in some forms.
- Education and jobs show old inequalities: castes that had education and advantages earlier are still better off, while many lower castes lag behind.
- Economic inequality continues: upper castes are still over-represented among the rich and in urban middle classes, while Dalits, Adivasis and many backward classes are poorer on average.
- Access to resources remains unequal: caste still affects access to land, education, and opportunities.

Caste alone cannot determine election results because:

- No constituency has only one caste majority. Candidates must seek support from more than one caste and community.
- No party gets all the votes of one caste. People of the same caste have different interests, especially based on income, gender, and political opinion.
- Other factors matter too: party loyalty, the performance of the government, and the popularity of leaders often decide elections.
- Ruling parties and sitting MLAs/MPs often lose, which shows that caste voting is not fixed.

Women’s representation in India’s legislative bodies is very low. The percentage of elected women members in the Lok Sabha touched 14.36% for the first time in 2019, and their share in the state assemblies is less than 5%. So the overall status is that women are still poorly represented.

Two constitutional provisions that make India a secular state are:

- There is no official religion for the Indian state.
- The Constitution gives freedom to all individuals and communities to profess, practice and propagate any religion, or not to follow any religion.

A third related provision is that the Constitution prohibits discrimination on grounds of religion.