RAJESH VAKHARIA , Delhi : Save Indian Family Foundation condemn the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Report, SIFF says this report is anti-male and biased.As per the World Economic Forum report India is ranked low at 114 out of 142 countries for which the report is made.
As usual, scarcely populated Scandinavian countries like Finland, Norway and Iceland with high per capita income ranked among the top. The problem with report is that it spreads misandry by blaming men for social issues that manifest due to poverty and bad Governance, while completely ignoring various disadvantages that men face.
This report openly acknowledges measuring gender gap only in one direction (for women) and it celebrates any gender inequalities suffered by men and boys. So, the report is openly one-sided and unscientific. Gender gap has to be measured in both directions for men and women.
For example, the lines in the report says,
“A country, which has higher enrollment for girls rather than boys in secondary school, will score equal to a country where boys’ and girls’ enrollment is the same.”
“The second choice was a one-sided scale that measures how close women are to reaching parity with men but does not reward or penalize countries for having a gender gap in the other direction. We find the one-sided scale more appropriate for our purposes.”
“If there is lower enrolment of boys in secondary school, then how can this disadvantage to boys be considered gender equality? So, using same logic the phenomenon of more suicides of men than women in a country is also considered as gender equality. “Such a definition of gender equality is completely bogus and unacceptable,” Says Anil Kumar Founder member of Save Indian Family Foundation (SIFF).
“What is the point in blaming men, when they already have more miserable lives than women with low life expectancy, much higher suicide rates? Three to four times more men compared to women die in accidents every year in India,” says Rajesh Vakharia President of Save Indian Family Foundation.
Indian Government must strongly oppose publication of such one-sided, biased unscientific reports that attempt to pit women and men against each other. SIFF urged the Government to focus on good Governance and poverty alleviation rather than getting under pressure from international agencies to institute anti-male discriminatory unjust policies into Governance. Interestingly, the report itself acknowledges that it is one-sided.
“The major factors that influence this Gender Parity index are per capita income and Governance issues than any serious gender discrimination. If we keep Saudi Arabia and a couple of countries aside as exceptions, then it is clear that countries with high per capita income are better ranked than countries with low per capita income. The better Governed non-corrupt nations are better ranked than corrupt countries,” says Anil Kumar, a social researcher with Save Indian Family Foundation.
“For example, maternal mortality rate and low literacy issues are more due to poverty and bad Governance than any kind of serious gender discrimination. When almost 20% of population is below poverty line in India, instead of crying out gender discrimination, we should work to reduce poverty.”
If we look at the Index, we can conclude that India is 28th worst country for women, but the report does not rank condition of men across the world. If such a ranking is done, then condition of Indian men will also be poorly ranked among the 142 countries for which the survey is conducted. It is obvious that in such an index, condition of men in Scandinavian countries will come out as best and India may get a rank of 105 or 110 as far as well being of men is concerned.
The men’s rights activists are upset about this report, because it can be easily twisted by women’s organizations to lobby to deny men social services like food security and protection from domestic violence. When poverty and bad Governance are the major issues for condition of women and also men, this report can be pushed to initiate a kind of war on men. Lakhs of men are already suffering from false dowry and false rape cases in India. Men work hard to make the economy grow and the World Economic Forum’s annual one sided reports can only worsen the men’s human rights in countries like India.
Though this report is completely women centric, yet it is called “Gender Gap Index” and the male gender is conveniently ignored and deliberately vilified.