A recent survey by Moneycontrol of the top 50 companies in India by market capitalisation revealed that women account only for 25.08 per cent of the total employees under the payroll of the top 50 Indian companies by market cap. Data available through regulatory filings, show that India Inc has a long way to go on gender equality.
In more than half of the companies analysed, female employees accounted for less than 10 per cent of the workforce. Meanwhile, as much as one-fifth of the companies recorded their number of women employees to be 5 per cent or less. “The Indian women professional’s career graph is defined by both our socio-cultural milieu and the inherent biases still prevalent at the workplaces. In the case of women who take breaks in their careers to attend to their familial commitments, the segueing is never a straight-forward one,” said Saundarya Rajesh, Founder – President, Avtar Group, a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) consulting firm.
According to an estimate, as much as 47 per cent of the women who were laid off during the COVID-19 induced lockdowns never returned to the workforce, while for men this figure stood at 7 per cent, “The COVID-19 pandemic added an extra layer of bias for working women and has resulted in many quitting due to burnout. “It is a fact that women are the primary caregivers at home. And, when women make the decision to return to their careers, they come with mental baggage – home,” Rajesh added.
Further analysis suggests that things aren’t much better when it comes to leadership positions as well. The cumulative percentage of female directors on the boards of companies tracked stands at just 17.75 per cent. Data revels that on average, the companies analysed had just above 11 male members on their board, while the figure for female members stood at just two. Moreover, as many as 33 companies had less than 20 per cent female board members while for eight of them, it was under 10 per cent.