Indian Women in Leadership

The past decade has witnessed an increased number of women participating in the workforce in many spheres of India’s society. Yet, Indian women largely remain underrepresented in senior management and leadership positions. This can be attributed to existing patriarchal beliefs and other socio-cultural barriers that have led to struggles for Indian women to set themselves free from the challenges associated with gender stereotypic roles. Despite these obstacles, modern India is showcasing an expanding middle class and increased service sector jobs, gradually influencing the mindset of people. Due to the availability of higher paying information technology (IT) jobs for educated women employees, men are coming forward and the burden of handling household and childcare activities for Indian women is being reduced. Organizations are also making dedicated efforts to break the shackles of gendered family roles by implementing progressive human resource development (HRD) practices. India is slowly but steadily moving toward a gender-neutral culture and aspiring to strike the right chord between the personal and professional lives of Indian men and women.

In today’s India, when we look at leadership roles, it is quite natural to ask why there are so few women in top decision-making positions. Searching for answers led us to look deeply into religious and traditional aspects of India. In this chapter, we explore constituents of various religious practices prevailing in India in connection with women and their leadership roles. From Vedic culture to the entry of new religions in the form of Christianity and Islam, we encapsulated various traditional dimensions of religions that are relevant for women’s aspirations to become leaders. In this chapter, we explored in detail dominant Indian religions, such as Hinduism and Islam. Other less common religions, as practiced in India, are briefly reviewed.

Women’s leadership in India continues to be an emerging topic. Women in India face many of the same challenges as women across the globe: using the education they have earned in the workforce, balancing a career with raising a family, and receiving the same benefits as men. Career development in India also faces uniquely Indian cultural hurdles: family pressures to marry rather than pursue a career, caste stereotypes, and lack of networking opportunities. However, traditional India is evolving to become an economic engine, and, with that, opportunities for Indian women are evolving. Through mentoring and other career development tools, Indian women’s leadership is advancing the future of women in India.

Debates on gender equality and women’s empowerment center on the premise of availing substantial benefits to women through mandated reserved quotas by way of legislation and policies. It ranges from the Five-Year Plans that have focused on women’s welfare to the National Commission for Women (1990) that has focused on women’s empowerment and advocacy. The policies adopted by the Government of India have focused on safety, equality, empowerment, and financial independence, as well as grassroots leadership for women. We also examine specific legislation for empowering women by various decision-making bodies in recent years and suggest implications of these legislative actions for women’s leadership.

Given patriarchal dominance in India, education has played a crucial role in developing the stature of women in India by enabling them to secure leadership positions in diverse fields. The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the influence of education in developing women leaders. In order to do so, a review of historical policies and practices related to women’s education and factors enabling and disabling women’s education is presented. Finally, implications are provided to aid research, theory, and practice of women’s education for the purpose of developing women leaders in India.

It takes a village to raise a child. The truth of this proverb is reflected in the state of women’s empowerment in India. Empowering women at a societal level is the first step toward developing women leaders. It takes the collective efforts of government agencies, world organizations, banks, trade unions, chambers of commerce, academia, think tanks, corporations, and nongovernmental organizations to empower women for leadership. The advantages of empowering women transcend individual and family levels and have implications for economic growth of the nation as well. In this chapter, we look at collaborations and partnerships that exist for empowering women for political leadership, economic leadership, business leadership, and social leadership in India. We then discuss the strengths and advantages of having collaborations to achieve the objective of developing women leaders in India and the practical challenges of working collaborations.

Gender and diversity issues in India continue to challenge organizations and human resource development (HRD) practitioners. The benefits and opportunities emanating from liberalization have not fully reached women and other underrepresented groups in India. We have provided an assessment of existing literature on the role of women in the corporate workplace in India. By examining literature, we highlighted key issues, challenges, and evidence of practices that can support and enhance participation of women in the corporate world. Next, we linked findings from research and public discussion of women’s leadership in corporate India by analyzing the contents of Twitter messages over two years to contextualize our findings in real-world contexts. The content analysis of the tweets captured the focus and efforts of organizational and HRD leaders to advance women in India. We also identified women CEOs from practitioner literature to offer growing evidence of their impact on organizations and society. Finally, we offered recommendations for research and practice.

The new millennium witnessed a new dawn in women entrepreneurship in India. More women are ready to venture extensively into this field with a rising awareness and opportunities perceived through the wakeup call slogans from the prime minister: “Make in India,” “Young India Rising,” and “Skill India to Scale India” (upscaling of skills). In this chapter, we focus on drivers for choosing entrepreneurship as a career or passion by women in India. The scope of the chapter also throws light on access to resources, socio-economic barriers, issues and challenges, sustainability, and core strengths and weaknesses Indian women entrepreneurs have, based on available literature, an online survey, and personal interviews. We conclude with highlighting the lessons learned and ways forward from success and failure stories.

The extent to which women in India occupy sufficient and important leadership positions in the government and hold powerful positions in the political system has a direct bearing on the socio-economic and political development of the nation. With this backdrop, we provide a historical review of women’s participation in and contribution to the government sector since Indian independence; present the current political leadership provided by women in India; highlight the initiatives, legislation, and reforms undertaken by the Indian government for promoting women’s leadership in government; discuss the current issues and trends related to women’s leadership in government positions in India; and suggest potential measures to promote and strengthen women’s leadership in the government sector in India.

Women have often been limited in India in their roles due to socio-cultural constraints, including politicization, rigid social norms, and expectations prioritizing family over career. Complexity in the social structure and a heterogeneous population of more than a billion varying in culture and religion have made it difficult for governments and institutions to implement policies that are inclusive and not gendered. In this chapter, we outline the scope of engagement of women leaders in the education sector in the last 70 years, including kindergarten through higher education, and elucidate their achievements. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze models, statistics, barriers, and challenges for women leaders in education, along with opportunities in the education sector in India.

India has a formidable presence of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) focused on capacity-building and development through various initiatives. The NGO sector works in many fields that include women’s empowerment, child rehabilitation, poverty, education, domestic violence, community development, rural and urban development, awareness and advocacy of rights, and so on, across India. The purpose of this chapter is three-fold: (a) to discuss the role of women leaders in the emergent NGO sector in twenty-first century India; (b) to provide a comprehensive understanding of woman leaders’ venture success, including a focus on both macro- and micro-level factors; and (c) to address the gap in the women leadership literature in the NGO sector, which is the third largest employer in India.

The landscape of women’s leadership today in Asian countries is in a state of flux with a slow but steady increase in women leaders. The path to the summit has not been easy for Asian women leaders with various roadblocks along the way, including gender stereotypes, rigid cultures, stringent organizational practices, family commitments, and limited educational opportunities. However, the silver lining boosting Asian women leaders to break through the glass ceiling is manifested through inclusive organizational practices, more emphasis on women’s education, and blurring of gender roles. This chapter is an overview of various barriers and successes of Indian women leaders as compared to their Asian counterparts in countries including China, South Korea, Sri Lanka, and Malaysia.

Every chapter in this book contains stories and facts that paint a dark picture for women in leadership in India. But they also contain examples of people, policies, and practices where there is hope for the future. In this chapter, I first focused on the many reasons why women face barriers to leadership and why they face a significant pay gap compared with men. I also compared the situation in India with the situation faced by women in other countries, primarily the USA: parenthood, occupational choice, discrimination, and sex bias. I then presented some avenues that present hope for Indian women, though the journey will be difficult: enact new laws and enforce existing laws, focus on youth, equalize college major and occupational choice, develop negotiating skills, demand family-friendly benefits, let employer self-interest take its course, and change the culture. For the light to shine, it will require the commitment and work of men and women.