COVER HINDI - Ministry of Women and Child Development

Gender Budgeting
- Budgeting for Gender Equity
6.1 The goals of human development are closely
intertwined with development and empowerment of
women, who, as an independent group constitute about
496 million (2001 Census) representing 48% of the total
population in the country. They comprise not only the
valuable human resources of the country but their socio
economic development sets the pace for sustainable growth
of the rest of the economy.
6.2 However, the reality is that women face disparities
in access to and control over resources. These disparities
get reflected in important parameters like health, nutrition,
literacy, educational attainments, skill levels, occupational
status etc. The poor status and value attached to women is
reflected in the fact that the female sex ratio for 0-6 age
group declined steeply from 945 in 1991 to 927 in 2001
implying that millions of girls went missing in just a
decade.
6.3 There are a number of gender specific barriers,
which prevent women from gaining access to their rightful
share in the flow of public goods and services. Unless these
gender requirements and their felt needs are incorporated
and mainstreamed in the planning and development
process it is apprehended that the fruits of economic growth
are likely to completely bypass a significant section of the
country’s population which does not augur well for the
future growth of the economy.
6.4 The planning process in the country had recognized
this fact, but it is only in the last two decades has there
been an explicit strategy to tackle gender related issues in
a systematic manner by introducing an element of gender
sensitivity in allocation of resources for women by
identifying women beneficiary oriented schemes of various
sectors, propagating the Women’s Component Plan (WCP)
to ensure not less that 30% of the funds / benefits flow to
women as well as encouraging Gender Budgeting to be
applied in all sectors. The Approach Paper to the Eleventh
CHAPTER-6
Plan specifically states that ‘gender equity requires
adequate provisions to be made in policies and schemes
across Ministries and Departments . It also entails strict
adherence to gender budgeting across the board’
6.5 The importance of Gender Budgeting has been
stressed time and again in different forums. To provide
further impetus to this objective, the Finance Minister in
2004-05 had mandated the setting up of Gender Budgeting
Cells in all Ministries/ Departments and highlighted the
perceived need for budget data to be presented in a manner
that brought out the gender sensitiveness of the budgetary
allocations.. This was followed by a more emphatic
commitment in the budget speech of 2005-06, wherein
the budgetary allocations under 10 Demands for Grant
estimated at Rs. 14379 crore were shown in a separate
statement as a part of the Gender Budgeting exercise. The
2006-07 Budget Speech revealed an estimated allocation
of Rs.28,737 cr. for benefit of women under 24 Demands
for Grant in 18 Ministries and Departments.
What is gender budgeting- a definition
6.6 Gender Budgeting is understood as a dissection of
the Government budget to establish its gender-differential
impacts and to translate gender commitments into
budgetary commitments. Thus Gender Budgeting.
— Looks at Government budget from a gender
perspective to assess how it addresses the needs of
women in all sectors
— It does not seek to create a separate budget but to
provide affirmative action to address the specific
needs of women
— Gender responsive budgeting initiatives provide a
way for assessing the impact of government revenue
and expenditure on women.
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