Lucknow, July 30: Around 86 per cent women in the state face violence and 96 per cent gender discrimination — suggests a survey conducted by the Institute of Women’s Studies, Lucknow University.
Interestingly, 80 per cent women in urban areas witness more violence as against 49 per cent in rural areas.
The survey was a part of the project undertaken by the institute to promote quality of life as an indicator in the Gender Development Index (GDI) of the state.
“Rather than mere sex aggregation of Human Development Index to calculate the GDI, for the first time we are trying to sensitise people about the issue of women empowerment by implementing the concepts of Professor Amartya Sen about assessing the quality of life in terms of capabilities,” said Professor Rakesh Chandra, Director of the Institute.
“The idea behind this survey is to conceptualise the complexity related to the disparity in the pace of gender development,” added Chandra.
According to the report, which was presented on Wednesday, the GDI should also look at two new indicators: political participation of women and domestic violence against women, apart from income, education and health of individuals.
The project group took a sample size of 1,500 women from five districts and assessed their quality of life on basis of happiness, self esteem, emotional quotient, self-concept, violence, decision making, mobility, political participation and health.
–Agencies