Kerala 2005 - of Planning Commission

CHAPTER 7
RECKONING CAUTION: EDUCATED UNEMPLOYMENT AND GENDER UNFREEDOM
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with another 78 per cent reporting household work and very
few reported idling or doing something else.
Contrary to our expectations, only a very small percentage
of the unemployed were members of some or the other
political or social organisation (only 7 per cent). There was
hardly any gender difference.
2.15 The Recognition Aspect of Unemployment
The recognition aspect of unemployment discussed earlier
was taken up for inquiry among those employed for a wage
or salary in the 2003 survey. It was found that 32 per cent
of the men and 20 per cent of women reported that they felt
their job was not commensurate with their qualifications.
Clearly, men experienced a greater mismatch than women.
The lower proportion of women corresponded with their
higher shares in regular/permanent employment. However,
given our earlier discussion of women’s position in regular
employment in terms of hierarchy, growing casualisation of
formal sector work and in the share of the informal sector,
it may be incorrect to conclude that employed women do
not have a recognition problem. Some part of this may well
be an artefact arising from the conditioning of women’s
aspirations on lines distinctly different from that of men.
This question was also posed to those self-employed. Here,
the mismatch was found to be smaller (18 per cent) with only
marginal difference between men (18 per cent) and women
(16 per cent). This can probably be due to the fact that the
choice of self-employment has a strong association with the
knowledge/skill acquired through education, as we shall see
later. However, when they were asked whether they continued
to be seeking employment, 46 per cent of the self-employed
reported that they were (46 per cent for men and 42 per cent
for women). This proportion was the highest for diploma
holders (66 per cent), followed by post-graduates (60 per cent)
and professionals (50 per cent). This seems to indicate that selfemployment
is perceived as a transitional arrangement. This
indicates the multiple facets of the recognition problem itself.
3. Aspects of Gender-related Unfreedom
3.1 Introduction
It is being argued now that the much lower gender gap
in basic capabilities in Kerala need not necessarily suggest
a ‘high status’ for women (Eapen and Kodoth, 2003). It
is true that the Gender Development Index estimated at
the regional level by several scholars’ places Kerala at the
top. In respect of Gender Empowerment Measures too,
which attempt to measure empowerment or autonomy in
terms of the extent to which women are able to use their
basic capabilities to acquire decision-making powers, both
economically and politically, Kerala is at or near the top
(Mehta, 1996; EPW 1996). Yet, on more direct measures of
autonomy, including household decision making, mobility
and access to/control over money, Kerala trailed Gujarat,
which had much lower levels of literacy (Visaria, 1996;
Rajan et al, 1994). The second National Family Health
Survey, 1998-99, which incorporated similar measures
of autonomy for ever-married women for the first time
is instructive. Among the percentage of women who
participated in each of four sets of household decisions,
Kerala was ranked 10th among 25 States, trailing Punjab,
Haryana, Gujarat, Goa, Himachal Pradesh and several
north-eastern States (Kishor and Gupta, 2004). 8 This was
the case on most areas of household decision-making, even
if only working women were considered (NFHS, 1998-
99). Findings of this nature question the much-glorified
straightforward relation between literacy and women’s
autonomy and raise the need to locate women’s educational
attainment and access to other resources within the extant
patriarchal social structures, specifically the family (Jeffery
and Basu, 1996; Heward and Bunwaree, 1999).
The question to ask seems to be: Where have women’s
‘achievements’ been directed? A decomposition of the
GDI is very revealing; high scores on education and health
among 15 States of India (ranking Kerala first) mask women’s
poor employment profile. 9 The State ranked 10th or 15th
according to different measures of income shares based on
gender work participation rates and wage rates (Seeta Prabhu
et al, 1996). High rates of literacy and impressive levels
of female education did not translate into rapid growth of
paid employment of women nor into upward occupational
mobility. Against this, the State is witnessing downtrends
in women’s property rights, rapid growth and spread of
dowry and high levels of gender-based violence, particularly
domestic violence, even as the levels of education continue
to rise. Thus, new questions need to be raised about the
conventional indicators of well being – education, health
and employment – particularly the ways they combine to
reflect extant gendered priorities. Also, there is the need to go
8 Decision-making on own health care, purchase of jewellery and other items, going to stay with parents/siblings and use of own
earnings was included in the analysis.
9 Work participation, particularly access to earned incomes is an important aspect of empowerment though by itself it does not
ensure control over earnings or women’s ability to take ‘self-interested’ decisions.