Harassment of women in Indian academics and research
B. B. Goel
Friday, 07 August 2009 13:28 UTC
It’s a very hush, hush topic in Indian academics. In personal discussion many people talk about it but there is no systemic study, no real system to safe guard people against sexual harassment. We all know how different it is to pass laws and its proper implementation in countries like India. Let’s start a new topic in this regard.
From my personal experience I know that it’s wide spread in every sphere of life in India, including Indian higher education and research circle. If you venture out in open public life, in more competitive corporate career in India, you can expect a far worse situation. I have never seen any young women in India walking freely in any public place, public transport and so on. Everyone is on some kind of “guard”.
I think only few selected faculties and some senior staff are involved in such activities to harass women. Although they are minority but they are powerful enough to make other faculties and students silent. Again it’s a reflection of our conservative society. Contrary to our general belief that India is safe for children and women, more than half of Indian kids are abused (much worse than US or Europe), more unfortunately, it’s not done by outsiders but relatives and family members. “We only take a false pride of the fact that 70% of the children never reported the abuse”. Check the following report by Indian govt and Indian express (Courtsey Jayant’s Blog).
Affected women also tolerate such nonsense behavior mainly due to faulty upbringing (to accept crimes and corruption in the name of “reality” and male folks never respect women in the family), social pressure and non efffective legal system. Some women might exploit it to get some extra privileges, as alleged.
Many male folks do not have sufficient experiences themselves and knows about such activities only through very close friends or wives. And the picture we get through such second-hand experiences is really scary. You need to remember that the best solution of a problem is to expose that first (in public), build public opinion and then act on personal basis first to encourage others to do the same. I think women are the best people to discuss it better. All right minded people should and some will support such efforts to make our society little cleaner and more open.
Updated 07 August 2009 13:30 UTC
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Anonymous
Yes we all are aware and can name atleast 1 scientist who is involved in such acts. Most of the time students leave. Directors or senior faculty of the dept should keep an eye on the trend of female students leaving a particular lab.
I strongly recommend an idea given in another thread of starting an exposure website where Indians can put names of faculty and students who are indulging in harassment, data manipulation, publishing undeserving results, undeserving candidate getting promotions or offers due to political or other connections and so on.
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Anonymous
India slips to 114th place (among 134 countries ) in global gender gap ranking: WEF
In 2007, India was ranked 114th while the country had cornered the 98th place in 2006. It seems that Indian ranking is deteriorating every year.India (114), (North) Korea (115), Iran (128) and Pakistan (132) continue to hold some of the lowest positions in the Asian rankings
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It’s really appalling that things like this still happen. There does need to be some kind of independent body to which people can take complaints, with some guarantee that they will be followed up. Often, I imagine, women are too afraid of the repercussions to speak out.
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Anonymous
Such incidents are not women specific, although this report highlighted only women issue. Any form of minority, (be it religious, caste, linguistic, gender, morality, honesty etc) will have a real hard time there in India. Just tell me a single constitutional authority in India where you can be assured to get justice in a impartial and time bound manner. I do not know any such authority, be it police or judiciary or village level justice (gram-panchayet) or political authorities (it overrides all other constitutional authorities). It’s all grin and bear phenomenon. Number of honest people with strong sense of morality and courage is dangerously low in that part of world. The consequence of opposing crime/corruption is too high there. The only way people seek solution is to join any form of strong group (within a small area in a town/village or at national level like organized terrorist groups) or just live without opposing any crime or corruption happening around you.
Science or research can not insulate you from this social evil, in the universities/institutes or outside. -
Anonymous
I agree with anonymous #4 that minority sufferer from majority or power. I know number of women scientist in national institutes who make life of their PhD student measurable, including male student. It is matter of justice, week and minority should be defend by rule.
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This is a very saddening situation. Thank you for highlighting it here. When a group is this oppressed it takes courage to raise the issues, and involves a degree of risk.
I know that on the web there is no such thing as anonymity, but here on NN pages I assume anonymity can be preserved as long as no slander or libel is committed, and so this seems a valuable place to flag up the issues. In addition to information and solidarity, I think it requires action at the highest levels – through legislation, through universities providing training to all staff and implementing strict codes of conduct and perhaps, as Angela says, through an independent body.
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Dear Ruth; Yes, the situation is frightening. As many messages in this Nature India blog said many times before that seeking justice itself is very dangerous in a country like India. How can you explain continuation of a director of a national level institute (National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow) who forged his CV (and it has been published in the web site of the biggest scientific-research body in India, CSIR)? Not a single Vice chancellor has ever been investigated impartially and prosecuted/punished for so many gross financial and many other irregularities! Even Indian Supreme Court judges do not follow internationally accepted standard for conflict of interest. Science and scientists can not remain aloof from the overall situation in a society/country. All the social evils are present in full force in Indian science. And that is not limited to harassment for women but widely present in all perceivable forms (from selection of PhD students to plagiarism to recruitment of many (if not majority) highest positions of policy making in Indian science/research). General Indian media and journalism (including scientific journalism) is more like organized propaganda than exposing the truth and forcing the authority to take corrective actions. In worst case, the director of an institute or a VC of a university resigns if ever feel the pressure due to corruption charges against them. Such resignations are portrayed as great victory and justice. Govt/authority dismisses the case(s) against such tainted people once they resign; no jail or other form of punishment ever demanded by prosecution/higher authority.
It’s a real miracle that there are still few people who are reasonably honest and trying their best to do some good research and honest teaching. -
Anonymous
And here comes the baby-cry…. all the social evils are present in full force in india na na na na
There are cases which becomes high-profile or never get touched upon everywhere in the world and India is not an exception but yes we have right to religiously cry that O my god nothing is working in India.
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Anonymous
Few chaps in this forum promised that he/they will write ONLY positive aspects about India. I hope those people may have something to say in this women issue, supported by facts and figure (real one, not distorted) to show that Indian women are having a great life with a rosy future. Let Indian women express their views. So far that lot is very silent (probably they know the cost of expressing honest opinions)!
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Anonymous
This is anonymous # 10…. Damn, I got instigated, anyway….
There are good forums where Woman in Science (in India) can bring their matters to gender bias related issues. Please refer to
http://indianwomenscientists.in/
http://www.ias.ac.in/womeninscience/index.htmGod says that he/she cannot help anyone who is not willing to help themselves. As anonymous # 11 points out, women should speak up. Especially the ones who feel there is a gender bias or if they are getting harassed (discussion initiator really uses extreme words to describe the situation, as if Indian Science and Society is just going to die…sky is falling… run…run….run) then they should search for appropriate channel to raise their voice. And they should be courageous to write to appropriate authorities for the action. Particularly in a open society like India where print, electronic and TV media is just waiting for a news…their voices will be heard.
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