Social Sciences Directory

Vol. 1, No. 1, 19-33, September 2012

Gender equality in the workplace: the perceptive

reality
Sangeeta Sharma *
University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India

Manju Sharma *
University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India

Introduction
Gender is a social construct that outlines the roles, behaviours, activities and attributes that
a particular society believes are appropriate for men and women. The assignment of these
roles and adoption of these traits can create gender inequities differences between men
and women that systematically favour one group to the detriment of the other (WHO).
Gender equality reinforces the attitude and practice of fair and impartial distribution of
resources and prospects for men and women. It promotes equal opportunity to men and
women in any social congregation. The innate property with which one is born does not
perpetuate gender differentiation. However the human world has created virtual and real
gender images confined to role specifications. These role limits have created divisive
identities. The ratio of divisiveness may vary from society to society but an argument which
can be theoretically proposed could be in terms of the universality of this gender division
defying its development, as the baseline criterion. Thus it takes different forms when it
comes to actuality. In developing societies in particular, this presents a very peculiar
situation where the institutional efforts put in by government to legalise gender equality
through Acts does not reflect a condition of attained equality. The difference between
actuality and reality is more or less guided by perceptions and, therefore, what is actually
been practiced might not be absolute, as many unforeseen factors may affect this
difference. Nevertheless it has always generated an incessant urge to unearth the truth
behind the gender issues. The reason is very obvious. There are paradoxes which may be so
deceptive, so that the reality of what is practiced in real social construct appears illusory
compared to what is conceptually framed.

*Email: sangeetajpr2004@yahoo.co.in; mansudhaa@hotmail.com

ISSN 2049-6869
http://dx.doi.org/10.7563/SSD_01_01_03

20 S. Sharma & M. Sharma .

The workplace is a setting where gender inequalities can be noticeable and sustained. Work
plays a significant component in shaping power and status for both women and men. This
generates gender inequalities in the distribution of everyday jobs. In the post-modern era,
strategies have been designed to deal with situations of gender discrimination. However,
gender inequality in the workplace is an acute and persistent problem, especially in
th
developing countries. According to the World Economic Forum (2011), India ranks 113 out
of 157 countries on its Gender Development Index (GDI). The GDI is calculated using three
(3) variables - life expectancy, education, and estimated earned income. Though there is
improvement of gender scores in recent years, India still lags far behind in terms of GDI and
this article attempts to examine the dilemma of gender equality in the workplace.
Previously, few studies have been conducted to explore different types of workplace
discrimination. According to the major findings of the survey conducted by Tata Consultancy
Services (2012) women continue to face many barriers on their way to the top, that are
unique to their gender. They are often under-represented in organizations, especially in
senior management roles and corporate boards. The report states that leadership
development programs are key retention measures for women. However, very few
organizations provide such programs. Generally, organisations are not allocating their
budgets, resources and targets to support the mandate on gender inclusion.
The rationale of this study lies in comprehending the perceptive reality about women, who
form part of the workforce in nearly all categories of jobs in India. Efficiency and success of
women is widely acknowledged all, but despite this woman in the Indian scenario are often
exposed to some form of gender discrimination or other. Although laws have been enacted
to provide equal opportunities in the workplace for both men and women, the fact is that
women and glass ceiling still exists. The present study is an effort to understand the
obscurity, reality and perceptions of the situation. This study was conducted on a medium
sized sample to measure the correlation between four variables viz., legal, institutional,
sociological and career. This was adopted because no decisive way of estimating the
representativeness of the sample could be used and, therefore, exact estimation of the
populations parameters could not be adhered to. A brief introduction of variables would be
pertinent as no empirical evidences are available to show any research undertaken by using
these variables.
Legal
Since independence, the government of India has propagated many laws to protect
womens rights. The constitution prohibits discrimination on many grounds, including
gender, and recognizes the principle of equality for all before the law and of opportunity in
matters relating to employment (Articles 14 to 16 of The Constitution of India, as modified 1
December 2007). Although the Visakha guidelines against sexual harassment were laid down
by the Supreme Court in 1997, studies show that working women are still not aware of this.
To study the legal status, the questionniares were designed to explore if the men and

Gender equality in the workplace 21

women in the sample are aware about the legal act for gender equality and/or whether
orientation programmes are being conducted by their organisation to ascertain gender
sensitivity.
Institutional
Specifically, the questionnaire is used to analyse the working ethos and acceptibility of
women as working partners in Institutions such as education and health. The Institutions
adopt in principle the regulations to accelerate gender equality. However the study brings
out interesting perceptions that are prevalent in professional institutions.
Sociological chores
In the Indian context the roles that men and women play in society are not biologically
determined, so much as they are socially determined. From the moment of birth, gender
expectations influence how boys and girls are treated. The study investigates if the social
myths are responsible for social inequality.
Career
Differences in gender can be easily seen in career choices of men and women. The current
study tries to find out how gender affects the career choices of men and women and if
gender specification hinder or favours their career preferences. This study uniquely
examines if there is any significant difference between gender equality perceptions and
reality.
Review of Literature
Stphanie affirms the scarcity of women among highly qualified professions. The
organization and management of work in such firms is typically project-based. This has many
consequences, such as: long working hours with fierce resistance to any reductions; unpaid
overtime; high management expectations of employee flexibility to meet unanticipated
client demands; and the need for employees to negotiate flexible working arrangements on
a case-by-case basis with a project manager, who often has much discretion on whether to
accommodate such requests. The study declares that women are particularly disadvantaged
in such a system, which could partly explain their under-representation in such jobs
(Stphanie, 2010).
Amartya Sen, Indian author and winner of the Nobel Prize in economics, discusses gender
inequality in his book The Argumentative Indian: Writings on Indian History, Culture and
Identity. He points out that the social movement for Indian women had been, until recently,
primarily focused on achieving better treatment and well-being for women: In the course of

22 S. Sharma & M. Sharma

the evolution of womens movement [] women are not passive recipients of welfareenhancing help brought about by society, but are active promoters and facilitators of social
transformations. Such transformations influence the lives and well-being of women, but also
those of men and childrenboys as well as girls. This is a momentous enrichment of the
reach of womens movement (Sen, A.2005).
Some studies have explored the experiences of women faculty members in Institutes of
Science and Technology, to understand the nature of the dual complexity faced by women.
Three major problems faced by female academic scientists were: general male dominance in
the work environment; feelings of isolation; and feelings of conflict between being a woman
and a scientist. Patrifocal ideology prevails at the workplace and in the family. Womens
capabilities are doubted in the initial stage of their career. There were no women deans in
any institute and the idea of a female director was almost unthinkable. Research suggests
the need for concentrated effort to analyse the experience of women scientists so that
collective efforts can be made to solve their problems (Gupta & Sharma, 2003). Women are
paid especially little in womens jobs such as those in cleaning and child care (ILO, 2003).
Therefore, women are increasingly choosing to enter traditionally male jobs such as
engineering, at least in North America. Such women are exposed to discrimination and this
may put their health at risk. For example, their mental health may be directly affected and
they may feel forced to take risks in order to prove that they are able to do the job (Messing
et al, 2003). Singh examined the socio-cultural determinants of the low representation of
women in top managerial positions in Asian organizations. Findings revealed that both male
and female respondents perceived that societal culture has an important bearing on both
thought processes and nature. Managers reported organizational culture to be favourable
to men. Male respondents believed more in hierarchical relationships, which support the
notion that Asian societies are hierarchical in nature, and affects interpersonal relationships
of people. In Asian Society, men are perceived to be assertive and commanding, whereas
women are expected to comply, obey and be submissive and docile. The study concluded
that if effective work-life policies are adopted, which support dual-earner couples,
employers would get benefits in turn (Singh, 2003).
Khandelwal, in his study on Gender Stereotypes at Work: Implications for Organizations
notes that stereotypes and perceptions of Indian women in the workplace appear to have a
significant negative impact on the position of women managers. The study suggests that
male Indian managers are viewed, stereotypically, as working in the areas of sales,
marketing and production; being good leaders, decision makers and bosses; and handling
challenging assignments. On the other hand, Indian women are viewed as working in HR and
administrative positions at low to junior levels, and in fields such as fashion and beauty.
Women in Indian organizations felt that such stereotypes result from not being given
challenging assignments. Yet, male managers saw women as being treated more leniently
than men when making mistakes (Khandelwal, 2002).
During the last decade an increasing number of studies have indicated adverse health
consequences of sexual harassment at work (Kauppinen, 1998). A survey among nurses in a

Gender equality in the workplace 23

hospital in Turkey revealed that 75% of the nurses reported having been sexually harassed
during their nursing practice: 44% by male physicians, 34% by patients, 14% by relatives of
patients and 9% by others (Kisa and Dziegielewski, 1996). In 1992, a female government
official in rural Rajasthan, India, was gang raped by 5 men whom she tried to refrain from
marrying off a girl (less than a year old) from their family. The demon of sexual harassment
of women and automatic discrimination of women at work hit Indian society very hard. It
was not people were unaware of these sorts of incidents but it was an eye opener. In this
case, many women's organizations filed a petition in the Supreme Court, since they were
unable to get justice at lower judicial levels. The petition was filed as Vishakha and, after five
years, in 1997 the Supreme Court of India gave a landmark judgment adding teeth to the
rights of women in the workplace by creating guidelines, called Vishakha guidelines. This is a
significant verdict by the highest court of the land which has ascertained the dignity of
women and issued directives to all working places to ensure necessary measures to check
sexual harassment. In this regard, it is now mandatory to investigate complaints of sexual
harassment filed by women in their workplace.
The idea that gender makes men more likely to be exposed to many risks at work has been
raised by several authors (Cru and Dejours, 1983; Loukil, 1997; Kjellberg, 1998). In some
countries, tensions may arise if men feel they are asked to do harder jobs (Messing and
Elabidi, 2003) while, in other situations, young men may readily accept requests to help
older women do heavy lifting in exchange for technical help from the women (Assuniao et
Laville, 1996). Organised sector employment constitutes a small share of total employment
in India and womens share of organised sector employment is only 17%. Even within the
organised sector, most women are located in the lower steps of the hierarchy (Joseph and
Prasad, 1995; Srivastava, 1997). Very few are managers, bosses or decision-makers (Agrawal
and Rao, 2004; Menon-Sen and Kumar, 2001). In Kerala, women constitute 39 per cent of all
organised sector workers (DGE&T). The States with a low share of womens employment in
organised sector jobs are Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Jammu and Kashmir and Orissa.
According to Habtu, despite accounting for 46.9% of the working population in Canada in
2001, women represented only 27% of skilled ICT workers. Studies continue to show how
ICTs stand apart even from other knowledge-intensive sectors; for instance, women
accounted for only 17.7% of software engineers. In comparison, highly qualified women are
especially well represented: in health care and social services (76.5% of the highly qualified
workforce in 2002): in the social sciences, teaching and public administration (66.6% of the
highly qualified workforce), and in the arts and culture (52.5% of the highly qualified
workforce) (Habtu, 2003; 2004). In several European countries, women are still underrepresented in the ICT sector as a whole (Valenduc et al, 2004) and are even more severely
under-represented in some specific ICT occupations. For instance, making up only 15% of ICT
workers across the European Union in 1999 and 17% of all ICT professionals in 2001
(Valenduc et al, 2004). While women are generally making inroads into qualified
employment, occupational segregation still persists.

24 S. Sharma & M. Sharma

A large body of literature indicates that men have many more occupational accidents than
women, in all working jurisdictions where data is available (Islam et al, 2001; Laflamme and
Lilert-Petersson, 2001). Men die at work much more often than women, from violence as
well as accidents (Helmkamp et al, 2000). The idea that the gender makes men more likely to
be exposed to many risks at work has been raised by several authors (Cru and Dejours, 1983;
Loukil, 1997; Kjellberg, 1998). In some countries, tensions may arise if men feel they are
asked to do harder jobs (Messing and Elabidi, 2003).
Gender stereotyping has affected research into reproductive health. In general, since
reproduction has been viewed as womens domain, male reproductive health related to
occupational exposures has been neglected (Wang, 2000; Varga, 2001). However, many
chemicals, ionising radiation, toxic contamination, high temperatures and possibly sedentary
work have been identified as hazardous to the male reproductive system (Bonde and
Storgaard, 2002). This study is unique in the sense that it focuses on understanding the
underpinning reasons for knowing why gender equality has not in reality been achieved.
Data and Methodology
This study is limited to empirically analysing the existent forms of gender expression at
different work places when viewed from legal, sociological, career and institutional
dimensions. Data for this particular study is randomly collected from four sectors viz.,
education, media, medicine & health and administration. The reason for including these
sectors is primarily to study perceptive reality about gender equality in various forms of
working places, depicting variety of working patterns. The equality is addressed through the
four dimensions mentioned above; therefore it would be interesting to see any variance in
what is advocated as theoretical constructs in relation to gender equality and its
manifestation in real situations. This article focuses on finding out concrete results by
constructing and testing hypotheses to find out differences in theory and perception. The
parameters identified include:
gender equality & perceptive gender reality extrapolated on Legal status
Institutional regulations
Career development
Sociological mores
In the scientific design the Karl Pearson Coefficient of Correlation is computed to find out the
covariance between variables identified above, to see if there is any association amongst the
identified variables. For this particular study the data is collected from the sample of 50
respondents, drawn randomly and representing specific sectors of education, health, media
and administration by instituting a validated questionnaire. The questions are framed to
assess the responses pertaining to the parameters identified. The unskilled sectors are

Gender equality in the workplace 25

excluded from this study as the responses were collected electronically. The external and
internal validation is done through pilot study which led to some changes to improve the
consistency. The data has been subjected to statistical analysis to test the following
hypotheses to investigate any differences:
H1 = There is a significant relationship between gender equality and perceptive
reality when extrapolated on legal, sociological, career and institutional dimensions
H2 = There is no significant relationship between gender equality and perceptive
reality when extrapolated on legal, sociological, career and institutional dimensions
The qualitative analysis is done by construing the questions on four different dimensions.
The results have been depicted in subsequent pages. The major limitation is that
respondents are selected from the mid-level elites. The results may vary in high level elites
and lower level workers. Nevertheless it reveals a general trend which can be tested further
through other such studies; hence it also paves the way for further research in this
important area.
This research article centres on the idea of judging the perceptive reality of gender in the
workplace. The four categories with different workplace backgrounds - education, health &
medicine, administrative services and media - were selected randomly. The data was
collected to compute the Karl Pearson Coefficient of Correlation between variables viz. legal,
institutional, sociological and career. The questionnaire had five sections pertaining to
different nuances of gender reality. Section 1 included questions of general awareness about
gender discrimination at workplace; Section 2 had specific questions from the legal arena;
Section 3 from the institutional regulations; Section 4 from the sociological mores; and
Section 5 from career development. The sample size selected for this particular article
constituted 51 from the respective strata.

26 S. Sharma & M. Sharma

Table 1: The Karl Pearson Correlation
Legal
Legal

Pearson correlation

.049

Sig.(2-tailed)
N

51

Sociological Pearson correlation

.049

Sig.(2-tailed)

.733

51

Career Pearson correlation

Sociological

**

**

51

51

51
**

.363

**

.363

.009

51

51
**

.631

.000

.000

.631

.542

Institutional

.000

Sig.(2-tailed)

Institutional Pearson correlation

**

.733

51

.542

Career

.239

.239

.009

.091

51

51

.405

**

.003
51

51
**

.405

Sig.(2-tailed)

.000

.091

.003

51

51

51

51

Interpretation
The study focuses on understanding the difficult conundrum of workplace gender equality
in relation to perceptive reality. The data compiled by the survey, which was specifically
designed to measure the co-variability between the variables, indicate a very interesting
trend. The above table partially supports both the hypotheses H1and H2. Neither
hypothesis, when extrapolated on legal, sociological, career and institutional dimensions, are
completely accepted. When it was extrapolated on Legal it a showed significant relationship
with Career, having a correlation value of .542 significant at .01 level (2-Tailed); and with
Institutional regulation the value is .631 at the same level of significance, which means it has
63.1% dependency with Institutional and 54.2% dependency with Career. However, with
Sociological situation it did not reflect a significant relationship, being as low as .049,
meaning only 4.9% dependency is indicated. The probable reason for this might be that
Institutional regulations are inherent in the legality and careers are defined by formal
positions on the basis of legal rational authority. On the other side, low value the with
Sociological situation might be due to low levels of awareness about gender sensitisation.
When it was extrapolated with Sociological it showed a significant relationship with Career,
the value of .363 (36.3%) meaning it is on the lower side which replicates the justification as
mentioned above. The correlation of Career with Institutional regulation is of the value .405
significant statistically but at 40.5% is an average dependency, again with same logic this
value shows that career awareness is of average level.

Gender equality in the workplace 27

The inference which can be drawn on the basis of the results is that the perceptive reality
about gender equality in the workplace, is that it is not perceived as expected. The reasons
may be that, in a developing society, there are many impediments to pursuing careers of
choices; that, at the societal level, gender discrimination is prevalent, and without economic
independence gender equality would remain an illusory reality. The most plausible
explanation is that, in the absence of a proper intervening educational strategy, gender
equality will be a distant objective.
In addition to the Pearson Correlation of Coefficient computation, a set of 13 questions was
also administered to draw more precise conclusions. The questionnaires were framed to
understand fundamentally two aspects:
can we have different but fair responses from males and females on questions of
gender roles
are the differences significant enough to describe the perceptive reality at the
workplace
Further the sample was representative of different professions and the data is depicted in
the graphs.
Graph I. Executive positions held by gender

The diagram provides a glimpse into the executive positions occupied by women in
organisations and shows that women are under-represented, especially in decision making
roles. As per the survey responses, only 8% of women held decision making posts whereas
92% were occupied by men. This demonstrates that womens participation across
organisations drops as the seniority of the role increases. Women are often found at the
entry level and representation drops dramatically in senior level roles. It is assumed that the

28 S. Sharma & M. Sharma

factors which are considered problematic for women and which hold them back are: lack of
flexible working hours; and adequate work life balance.

Graph II(a): Perceptive reality

It is pertinent to analyze the responses registered by individual respondents. When the

question regarding unfitness for challenging roles was asked to females and male separately,
86.2% of females and 85.7% of males responded no, which means that the challenging
roles are getting less gender specific.
Leadership is an important aspect of ensuring gender equality. However, when the question
was asked about the undermining of leadership qualities, the responses showed a very
peculiar trend. 75.9% of females and 71.4% of males responding in the category of no but,
more significantly, 24.1% of females and 28.6% of males responded in the category of yes.
The difference of 4.5% indicates that there is a sufficient number of responses to prove the
contradictory position stating that leadership qualities are undermined in males more than
that of females, which can be attributed to the assertive nature of males.
The economic independence is a major determining factor in gender equality that
influences perceptions about equal treatment at the workplace. The graph (IIa) also support
this by registering more responses in favour of this inclination, as 20.7% of responses are
female and 14.3% are male. Perhaps the reason for this could be that women might accept
jobs at a lower package to prove their ability to perform the challenging roles, as reflected in
the earlier response.

Access to land, housing and property are the principal factors determining the economic and
social well-being of women. Graph II(a) explains that 69% of females and 58.6% of males are
aware about womens property rights in India. However, 31% of women and 13.8% of men
Gender equality in the workplace 29
are uninformed about any such privileges. The results show that, among men and women
alike, there is still a lack of awareness about property rights. In addition to this, a large
proportion of women (31% > 13.8%) do not have information and resources to obtain what
they are entitled to. Women who earlier stayed at home to attend to domestic duties are
now maintaining work and home simultaneously, participating in the process of economic
development on an equal footing with men.
The above graph shows that 17.2% of women and 10.3% of males feel insecure at the work
place. Though the percentage is small, this shows that safety norms set up by their
respective establishments are not adequate. (This is slightly skewed data as none of the
participant in the present study was exposed to late night duties, which possibly would
increase the fear of insecurity.)
The Constitution of India declares that all citizens are equal before the law and are entitled
to equal protection. It prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex and commits the State to
take steps to ensure the full participation of women in all spheres of life. The above graph
shows that 37.9% of female employees are the victim of delayed promotion; simultaneously
42.9% of male employees face the problem of delayed promotion which possibly may be due
to the weakness of the systems existing in their organizations. One of the basic rights
women have, is not to be discriminated against in the workplace based on their gender.
Unfortunately, the reality does not always comply with the law and women continue to be
discriminated against in manifold ways.
Graph II(b): Perceptive reality

In Graph II(b), the responses illustrate that 27.6% of females and 23.8% of males have
experienced inequity at their workplace due to their gender. The gap between men and
women (27.6%> 23.8%) shows that more women feel that gender discrimination exists. It is

difficult to find out a single reason for discrimination against women but the researcher
assumes that the basic reason behind this is because of stereotyping and misguided
preconceptions of womens roles and abilities, commitment and leadership style. The
30 S. Sharma & M. Sharma
response also illustrates that discrimination against men also occurs in the workplace,
particularly in health care. The results show that 37.9% of females and 23.8% of males feel
that their institute does not have gender inclusive culture. For that reason it is vital to
provide a gender inclusive culture which encourages each genders career progression.
Sexual harassment is usually about expressing male power over women. The Protection of
Women against Sexual Harassment at Work Place Bill 2010 states that every employer is
required to constitute an internal complaints committee at each office, for redress of
complaints. The above graph shows that 17.2% of females and 19% of males feel that there
are no laws and policies at their workplace to take punitive action against gender
discrimination and sexual harassment. This shows that, in spite of the above mentioned
laws, workplaces in India do not adequately provide women with specific protection from
sexual harassment in their workplaces and that endorsement of such legislation will take
considerable time.
In addition to this the graph also depicts that the majority of men and women (76.2%,
93.1%) agree that gender laws are mandatory for preserving gender equality. However 6.9%
of female and 23.8% of male are of the view that such regulations are not compulsory for
preserving gender equality.
Bullying and sexual harassment can create negative work environments and unhealthy
consequences for employees. The above graph represents that 27.6% of females and 4.8% of
males agree that they have been bullied at work due to their gender. The gap between men
and women states that women are more prone to be the victims of bullying.
Further, it is unlawful for employers to discriminate because a woman is pregnant or has
recently delivered. However, 37.9% of females and 33.3% of males stated that, in their view,
pregnant and new mothers are considered incompetent for jobs. This may be because family
responsibilities are considered as hurdles to womens professional commitment.
Conclusion
Policy Interventions
The statistical analysis indicates that there is a significant difference in the ways gender
equality is perceived and applied in the workplace, be it legal, institutional or otherwise.
Interestingly it was found that there existed a significant difference for the reasons, some of
which could be obvious and some more obscure. The obvious reasons could be:
sociologically-driven role specifications that are prevalent in India
patriarchal form of social structuring which is also reflected at workplace

stereotyping image of female, confined to family roles and which directly leads to
role conflict if they opt for employment

Gender equality in the workplace 31

Similarly there are some reasons which have obscure explanations such as not trusting the
decision making capabilities of women in general. Customarily they are believed to be more
emotionally complex and hence are charged with having less rationality in their employment
performance. In the Indian context, the discrimination begins at an early stage of
socialisation and becomes reflected in the workplace.
The theoretical premises included in studies and the practical reality are far apart for the
reasons cited above, but it is high time that policy directives are planned and aim to adhere
to the principle of gender equality. The moderately high correlation values with the Career
and Institution regulations indicate that gender equality in its true sense can only be
attained when more career options are created and institutional regulations are exercised in
the proper way, which eventually reduces the gap between perception and reality. As an
emerging economy, India does provide an opportunity for government to design policy
pertaining to this area. Also, importantly, the technological proliferation in the education
sector is making a difference to the perceptions of a younger generation that might
perpetuate equality in a real sense. Constitutionally, increasing awareness about legal
aspects will help to achieve gender equality. Hence the categorical interventions can be
suggested as:
At the formative levels of personality development, educational institutions need to
sensitise individuals to accept other genders as equal
The conventional gender roles which are divisive and prevalent in India must be
transformed systematically by increasing employability
In the workplace the relationship between employer and employee must be driven
by formal regulations to make them gender inclusive
The government must ensure the implementation of laws, to create a conducive
environment to reinforce equality
Women should be involved in policy development and planning. The ensuing
policies and programs are more likely to be helpful and effective if these policies
reflect the perspective of girls and women
Employers can approach sex discrimination by implementing gender-related
education and training programs. These programs help employees to explore
attitudes and belief systems about gender issues
This study is unique in character because it explores the latent undercurrents pertaining to
gender equality. Changes will have a functional impact on attaining gender equality in the
workplace, but for societies with a deeply entrenched cultural ethos,,this gender
transformation happens at a slower pace. This inference is well supported by the data

analysis, thus the suggestive trajectory is an important input for accelerating the pace. The
modern era must dissuade any such practice which justifiably promotes discriminatory
tendencies and must work for equality by changing perceptions. Thus this study has included
a moderate sample but sets a direction for future research in this area. As with all studies,
32 S. Sharma & M. Sharma
this one has some limitations. The sample size was too small to make statistical
generalisation of the situation of gender equality, and was limited to four sectors viz.,
education, media, medicine & health and administration. However, there are several other
sectors were women are assumed to be discriminated.
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