MIZORAM and Meghalaya have been reported to be the top two Indian states with the least gender gap in McKinsey Global Institute’s (MGI), “The Power of Parity: Advancing Women Equality in India” report. The gender parity in the two northeastern states along with three states of Kerala, Goa, and Sikkim have been rated to be roughly in line with Argentina, China, or Indonesia. In contrast Assam, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh have been grouped as India’s bottom five states on gender parity by MGI, which similar to the situation in Chad and Yemen. Ironically the Report also states that the top five states account for just four per cent of India’s female working-age population, while the bottom five comprise a much larger 32 per cent. The MGI Report states that Indian women face extremely high inequality on two of three dimensions associated with physical security and autonomy (sex ratio at birth and intimate partner violence) and high inequality on the third which relates to child marriage.
Perhaps the Report has glossed over the fact that teenage pregnancies which occur outside of the institution of marriage in Meghalaya and which can be equated to child marriage without the strings attached as in the latter are very high. This is one of the reasons cited for Meghalaya’s high fertility rate. And considering that rape cases, including the rape of girl children are reported nearly every day one wonders how the Report did not find this a reason for listing women’s physical insecurity as a problematic area in Meghalaya. The gender gap in politics is still very high in Meghalaya and highest in Mizoram which has only one woman MLA in a House of 40. Out of 60 MLAs in Meghalaya only 5 are women. The gender gap in politics plays out in the kind of interventions which are critical to women’s health and nutrition. The Mckinsey Report gives a false sense of comfort to the states of Mizoram and Meghalaya and needs to be critiqued by scholars and civil society