Role of Indian Women in Decision Making Process Agrahari Kalpana Sanjeev*, Assistant Professor *Department of Political Science, Kumaun University, Almora, Uttarakhand, kalpanaagrahari@rediffmail.com Abstract India is one of those countries in the world where right of suffrage was granted to women before World War II. Political awareness among women has increased with the time but they are still deprived of decision-making positions. In the current political scenario women occupy barely 11 percent of total parliamentary seats, participation in cabinet is no more than six percent, representation in Supreme Court and High Courts is less than four percent and in the field of administration and management merely three percent are participant. Patterns of marginalization and subordination that characterize women's common experiences in patriarchy in most other power structures such as the family, business enterprises, political parties, religious organizations, labour unions and media establishments are also noticeable. The basic factor responsible for insufficient participation are traditional thinking, disbelief of society, economic dependency, heavy load of domestic work and hesitation towards public life. Government must make a national policy on women and it must be coupled with the national planning of development. The most important thing is that, the target of participation cannot be achieved only through governmental and technical efforts. Development of an informal mental workout is needed for it, where men and women both are understood to be the agent of development without any discrimination. Top Keywords Gender equality, Women's participation, Under-participation, Decision making. Top |