In the Indian democracy which is premised on non-discrimination and gender equality, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are expected to lead processes of social transformation and be at the vanguard of progressive, democratic and inclusive practice. In India, despite a continuous increase in women’s enrolment for over two decades (46.6 % in 2016-17) and the hiring of female faculty (39% in 2016-17), women encounter high levels of misogyny and violence in HEIs. Recent years have witnessed a spate of protests across university and college campuses in India highlighting the pervasiveness of gender based discrimination and misogynist practices and cultures. This, despite constitutional mandates, progressive legislations such as Sexual Harassment of Women at the Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act 2013 and instructions from regulatory bodies like the UGC, presents a paradox.
In HIEs, discrimination and glass ceilings also operate for female faculty. Additionally, there is a lack of transparency in implementation of anti-sexual harassment policies. These conditions in HEIs do not augur well for a country grappling with declining rates in Female Labor Force Participation (from 36% in 2005-06 to 24% in 2015-16), with college-educated women as one of the two groups that have experienced the largest drop.
In this context, WISCOMP works collaboratively with universities and colleges to develop Templates for Gender Audits. This process seeks to build sensitivity on the entire spectrum of gender based violence including sexual harassment, discrimination and exclusion on campuses, and facilitates institutionalization of gender just policies, practices and procedures which reinforce universities and colleges as ‘gender-just work spaces’.
WHAT IS A GENDER AUDIT?
Gender Audits provide a context to re-envision universities and colleges as ‘gendered organizations’ with the potential to become more inclusive and gender just. It provides a space for HEIs to generate dialogues among senior management team, faculty, administrative staff and students to help identify and explore opportunities for creating more inclusive policies, procedures and practices.
The focus here is not to criticize those at the helm of universities and colleges but to collectively re-imagine how systems perpetuate inequities and in what subtle and overt ways are we more inclusive or exclusive through our policies and practices. It is the work that the insiders do to transform their academies into more just and inclusive workspaces, by setting short-term and long-term goals toward greater gender equity and inclusivity and by evolving strategic ways of getting there. Gender Audits are a participatory, long-term process of slow change.