On 24th July, 2013 the Department of Land Resources of the Ministry of Rural Development, Governm... more On 24th July, 2013 the Department of Land Resources of the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India released the Draft National Land Reforms Policy for discussion . As per the draft policy, there is a need to revisit land reforms in the face of increasing demand for land for housing, industrialization, feminization of agriculture and landlessness of nearly half of the country’s rural population, particularly the marginalized as well as stagnating agricultural yields and the evidence on productivity of small farms. The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (RFCTLARR), which came into effect on 1st January 2014, also falls under the purview of the draft policy. Land reforms in India were a major policy initiative in the post-independence period. To check the exploitative and iniquitous revenue system established under the colonial rule, a notable achievement of land reforms during this period was the abolition of the Zamindari system. In the early 1960s land reforms disappeared from India’s development agenda as food crisis shifted the entire focus on to the green revolution. Rural unrest in the late 1960s and early 1970s brought it back into the agenda. In the 1990s, with the advent of neo-liberal policies, land reforms again went off the radar. However, in spite of women’s critical contribution to land movements throughout history, until the draft policy land reform in India had left them unacknowledged. The following section discusses the notable features of the draft policy with regard to Gender and Equity.
For urban prosperity to reach women, efforts have to be made to build an inclusive city. It is im... more For urban prosperity to reach women, efforts have to be made to build an inclusive city. It is important to state here that urban women comprise of a highly heterogeneous group. An inclusive city, thus, is one in which every citizen- rich, poor, educated, illiterate, young, old, and male or female has an equal right to the services, amenities and resources of the city. Additionally, the citizen is free to express her/his economic, cultural, religious and political will. A city can be inclusive in terms of space, economy and its physiology i.e. how it functions.
As a growing economic power, India is increasingly becoming an influential actor in global climat... more As a growing economic power, India is increasingly becoming an influential actor in global climate negotiations. It has among the world’s lowest per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions but is the fifth largest source of GHG globally (in total tonnes). India is one of the most vulnerable nations to the effects of climate change. .....Poor people are more vulnerable to climate change due to their limited adaptive capacities to a changing environment and among them, the rural poor and rural women are the ones most immediately affected.Women are disproportionately involved in natural resource-dependent activities, such as procurement of water, food and fuel for household consumption; shortage in the supply of these essential substances only adds to their workload.
It is argued that though there is literature available on the effects of FDI on development, such... more It is argued that though there is literature available on the effects of FDI on development, such studies have generally been gender-blind. Additionally, the limited body of work on the relationship between FDI and gender has been restricted to the analysis of women’s employment and wages in the manufacturing sector. It has been found that FDI, in the short-run, has had a positive impact on women’s employment and wages in semi-industrialized countries. However, impact can also be assessed in terms of women’s autonomy, empowerment and general well-being.
Placing the debate within the Indian context, this brief addresses the key questions such as: why... more Placing the debate within the Indian context, this brief addresses the key questions such as: why do we need affirmative action, what has been the political impact of affirmative action, should quotas be extended to the national parliament, do we need sub-quotas to ensure diversity, and, can quotas achieve transformative gender impact?
In this note we identify the changing pattern in education enrolment and attainment over time, in... more In this note we identify the changing pattern in education enrolment and attainment over time, in both rural and urban India. In order to draw a comparison over time, we review the participation in elementary and higher education for different age groups in population. The progressive education completion rate for the older to younger population is indicative of trends in education attainment over time.
This paper discusses the situation of community participation in India, the various programmes in... more This paper discusses the situation of community participation in India, the various programmes initiated to facilitate it and the roles of various interest groups towards the same. The paper is divided broadly into three sections. The first section - National Context: Facilitating Community Participation via Decentralization - discusses the provisions undertaken by the government to facilitate community participation. The second section - Local Expressions of Community Participation - discusses acts of community participation that have evolved independent of government interventions. The third section - Participation: A critical analysis - critically analyzes participation and the role of civil society in the same.
Home-based work constitutes a large segment of informal economy in South Asia. A highly significa... more Home-based work constitutes a large segment of informal economy in South Asia. A highly significant number of home-based workers are women. Several studies have found that home-based workers are primarily live in the low-income urban localities. They are highly exploited, almost invisible as worker and operate on the margins with almost no bargaining voice either as workers or as a group. Sadly, the value of their work is ignored and overlooked both in and outside the domestic periphery. In addition to that the instability and invisibility of their work make their lives in such a vulnerable situation that they sometime lose the ability to recognize the critical issues related to their work and lives. The home-based workers are deprived of taking any advantage from the social security schemes run by the government for the workers, and at the same time they are totally unaware about the social security measures taken by the government for the poor and marginalized citizens. The present study tries to unpack the different dimensions of the risk and vulnerabilities of the home based in five south Asian countries and also makes a modest attempt to find the possible explanations behind the indifference attitude of the home-based workers to know their entitlements for accessing whatever social security schemes that run in their respective countries.
A Resource Pack on Gender Transformative Evaluations is a product of the concerted efforts of the... more A Resource Pack on Gender Transformative Evaluations is a product of the concerted efforts of the feminist evaluation network that came together during the seven workshops over the life of the ‘Engendering Policy through Evaluation’ project run by the Institute of Social Studies Trust, New Delhi (with the support of IDRC and Ford Foundation). The Resource Pack has four chapters: an introductory chapter written by Ranjani Murthy and Sonal Zaveri; a second chapter on the principles and frameworks of gender transformative evaluations by Renu Khanna, Ranjani Murthy and Sonal Zaveri; a third chapter on methods and tools of gender transformative evaluations by Rajib Nandi; and a fourth chapter on using feminist lens with various evaluation approaches written by Renu Khanna, Sonal Zaveri and Rituu B. Nanda.
A Resource Pack intends to fill the gap in the literature on what constitutes gender transformative evaluations, not just from a theoretical perspective, but from a practical perspective of doing evaluations, using the rich information gathered by the project over four years.
This article examines how paid domestic workers in India fight to reproduce themselves by attaini... more This article examines how paid domestic workers in India fight to reproduce themselves by attaining recognition for their employment relationship and struggling to advance their labor rights. We find a striking convergence toward female-dominated unions that articulate the recipient of domestic services as “employers,” their employment relationship as an exploitative one in terms of time and dignity, and the household as a place of work and profit. To ensure a focus on women members and leaders, domestic workers’ have developed different union types including politically-affiliated and independent unions, as well as unions affiliated to NGOs, faith-based institutions, and cooperatives. Domestic workers’ direct, one-to-one employment relationship has led organizations to empower workers to confront employers’ daily control of workers’ associations (even outside the workplace), citizenship rights, worth, and dignity. However, because domestic workers’ employment relationship is still ...
On 24th July, 2013 the Department of Land Resources of the Ministry of Rural Development, Governm... more On 24th July, 2013 the Department of Land Resources of the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India released the Draft National Land Reforms Policy for discussion . As per the draft policy, there is a need to revisit land reforms in the face of increasing demand for land for housing, industrialization, feminization of agriculture and landlessness of nearly half of the country’s rural population, particularly the marginalized as well as stagnating agricultural yields and the evidence on productivity of small farms. The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (RFCTLARR), which came into effect on 1st January 2014, also falls under the purview of the draft policy. Land reforms in India were a major policy initiative in the post-independence period. To check the exploitative and iniquitous revenue system established under the colonial rule, a notable achievement of land reforms during this period was the abolition of the Zamindari system. In the early 1960s land reforms disappeared from India’s development agenda as food crisis shifted the entire focus on to the green revolution. Rural unrest in the late 1960s and early 1970s brought it back into the agenda. In the 1990s, with the advent of neo-liberal policies, land reforms again went off the radar. However, in spite of women’s critical contribution to land movements throughout history, until the draft policy land reform in India had left them unacknowledged. The following section discusses the notable features of the draft policy with regard to Gender and Equity.
For urban prosperity to reach women, efforts have to be made to build an inclusive city. It is im... more For urban prosperity to reach women, efforts have to be made to build an inclusive city. It is important to state here that urban women comprise of a highly heterogeneous group. An inclusive city, thus, is one in which every citizen- rich, poor, educated, illiterate, young, old, and male or female has an equal right to the services, amenities and resources of the city. Additionally, the citizen is free to express her/his economic, cultural, religious and political will. A city can be inclusive in terms of space, economy and its physiology i.e. how it functions.
As a growing economic power, India is increasingly becoming an influential actor in global climat... more As a growing economic power, India is increasingly becoming an influential actor in global climate negotiations. It has among the world’s lowest per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions but is the fifth largest source of GHG globally (in total tonnes). India is one of the most vulnerable nations to the effects of climate change. .....Poor people are more vulnerable to climate change due to their limited adaptive capacities to a changing environment and among them, the rural poor and rural women are the ones most immediately affected.Women are disproportionately involved in natural resource-dependent activities, such as procurement of water, food and fuel for household consumption; shortage in the supply of these essential substances only adds to their workload.
It is argued that though there is literature available on the effects of FDI on development, such... more It is argued that though there is literature available on the effects of FDI on development, such studies have generally been gender-blind. Additionally, the limited body of work on the relationship between FDI and gender has been restricted to the analysis of women’s employment and wages in the manufacturing sector. It has been found that FDI, in the short-run, has had a positive impact on women’s employment and wages in semi-industrialized countries. However, impact can also be assessed in terms of women’s autonomy, empowerment and general well-being.
Placing the debate within the Indian context, this brief addresses the key questions such as: why... more Placing the debate within the Indian context, this brief addresses the key questions such as: why do we need affirmative action, what has been the political impact of affirmative action, should quotas be extended to the national parliament, do we need sub-quotas to ensure diversity, and, can quotas achieve transformative gender impact?
In this note we identify the changing pattern in education enrolment and attainment over time, in... more In this note we identify the changing pattern in education enrolment and attainment over time, in both rural and urban India. In order to draw a comparison over time, we review the participation in elementary and higher education for different age groups in population. The progressive education completion rate for the older to younger population is indicative of trends in education attainment over time.
This paper discusses the situation of community participation in India, the various programmes in... more This paper discusses the situation of community participation in India, the various programmes initiated to facilitate it and the roles of various interest groups towards the same. The paper is divided broadly into three sections. The first section - National Context: Facilitating Community Participation via Decentralization - discusses the provisions undertaken by the government to facilitate community participation. The second section - Local Expressions of Community Participation - discusses acts of community participation that have evolved independent of government interventions. The third section - Participation: A critical analysis - critically analyzes participation and the role of civil society in the same.
Home-based work constitutes a large segment of informal economy in South Asia. A highly significa... more Home-based work constitutes a large segment of informal economy in South Asia. A highly significant number of home-based workers are women. Several studies have found that home-based workers are primarily live in the low-income urban localities. They are highly exploited, almost invisible as worker and operate on the margins with almost no bargaining voice either as workers or as a group. Sadly, the value of their work is ignored and overlooked both in and outside the domestic periphery. In addition to that the instability and invisibility of their work make their lives in such a vulnerable situation that they sometime lose the ability to recognize the critical issues related to their work and lives. The home-based workers are deprived of taking any advantage from the social security schemes run by the government for the workers, and at the same time they are totally unaware about the social security measures taken by the government for the poor and marginalized citizens. The present study tries to unpack the different dimensions of the risk and vulnerabilities of the home based in five south Asian countries and also makes a modest attempt to find the possible explanations behind the indifference attitude of the home-based workers to know their entitlements for accessing whatever social security schemes that run in their respective countries.
A Resource Pack on Gender Transformative Evaluations is a product of the concerted efforts of the... more A Resource Pack on Gender Transformative Evaluations is a product of the concerted efforts of the feminist evaluation network that came together during the seven workshops over the life of the ‘Engendering Policy through Evaluation’ project run by the Institute of Social Studies Trust, New Delhi (with the support of IDRC and Ford Foundation). The Resource Pack has four chapters: an introductory chapter written by Ranjani Murthy and Sonal Zaveri; a second chapter on the principles and frameworks of gender transformative evaluations by Renu Khanna, Ranjani Murthy and Sonal Zaveri; a third chapter on methods and tools of gender transformative evaluations by Rajib Nandi; and a fourth chapter on using feminist lens with various evaluation approaches written by Renu Khanna, Sonal Zaveri and Rituu B. Nanda.
A Resource Pack intends to fill the gap in the literature on what constitutes gender transformative evaluations, not just from a theoretical perspective, but from a practical perspective of doing evaluations, using the rich information gathered by the project over four years.
This article examines how paid domestic workers in India fight to reproduce themselves by attaini... more This article examines how paid domestic workers in India fight to reproduce themselves by attaining recognition for their employment relationship and struggling to advance their labor rights. We find a striking convergence toward female-dominated unions that articulate the recipient of domestic services as “employers,” their employment relationship as an exploitative one in terms of time and dignity, and the household as a place of work and profit. To ensure a focus on women members and leaders, domestic workers’ have developed different union types including politically-affiliated and independent unions, as well as unions affiliated to NGOs, faith-based institutions, and cooperatives. Domestic workers’ direct, one-to-one employment relationship has led organizations to empower workers to confront employers’ daily control of workers’ associations (even outside the workplace), citizenship rights, worth, and dignity. However, because domestic workers’ employment relationship is still ...
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Research Reports by Shiny Saha
Land reforms in India were a major policy initiative in the post-independence period. To check the exploitative and iniquitous revenue system established under the colonial rule, a notable achievement of land reforms during this period was the abolition of the Zamindari system. In the early 1960s land reforms disappeared from India’s development agenda as food crisis shifted the entire focus on to the green revolution. Rural unrest in the late 1960s and early 1970s brought it back into the agenda. In the 1990s, with the advent of neo-liberal policies, land reforms again went off the radar. However, in spite of women’s critical contribution to land movements throughout history, until the draft policy land reform in India had left them unacknowledged. The following section discusses the notable features of the draft policy with regard to Gender and Equity.
The present study tries to unpack the different dimensions of the risk and vulnerabilities of the home based in five south Asian countries and also makes a modest attempt to find the possible explanations behind the indifference attitude of the home-based workers to know their entitlements for accessing whatever social security schemes that run in their respective countries.
Books by Shiny Saha
A Resource Pack intends to fill the gap in the literature on what constitutes gender transformative evaluations, not just from a theoretical perspective, but from a practical perspective of doing evaluations, using the rich information gathered by the project over four years.
Papers by Shiny Saha
Land reforms in India were a major policy initiative in the post-independence period. To check the exploitative and iniquitous revenue system established under the colonial rule, a notable achievement of land reforms during this period was the abolition of the Zamindari system. In the early 1960s land reforms disappeared from India’s development agenda as food crisis shifted the entire focus on to the green revolution. Rural unrest in the late 1960s and early 1970s brought it back into the agenda. In the 1990s, with the advent of neo-liberal policies, land reforms again went off the radar. However, in spite of women’s critical contribution to land movements throughout history, until the draft policy land reform in India had left them unacknowledged. The following section discusses the notable features of the draft policy with regard to Gender and Equity.
The present study tries to unpack the different dimensions of the risk and vulnerabilities of the home based in five south Asian countries and also makes a modest attempt to find the possible explanations behind the indifference attitude of the home-based workers to know their entitlements for accessing whatever social security schemes that run in their respective countries.
A Resource Pack intends to fill the gap in the literature on what constitutes gender transformative evaluations, not just from a theoretical perspective, but from a practical perspective of doing evaluations, using the rich information gathered by the project over four years.