Advancing the Women-led Development Model

Why in news?

NCW’s consultation on women’s property rights and socio-economic justice has renewed the call to move towards women-led development.

UPSC Relevance 

Mains: GS1 – Role of women and women’s organisations, social empowerment; 

GS2 – Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections, mechanisms and laws for their protection. 

Women’s Development vs Women-led Development

For decades, Indian policy treated women mainly as a group to be protected and looked after. Schemes for nutrition, maternal health, safety and education were designed for women, but decisions about them were mostly taken by others. This is women’s development (or women-centric development).

Women-led development goes a step further. It sees women as decision-makers, asset owners, entrepreneurs and leaders who shape the direction of growth itself. The question changes from “what can the State give women?” to “what can women do if barriers are removed?”

Distributive vs Compensatory Justice – the main difference

• Compensatory justice: Makes up for past or present harm. Examples – Article 17 (abolition of untouchability), Article 23 (ban on trafficking and forced labour). 
• Distributive justice: Fair sharing of resources so that harm does not happen in the first place. It flows from Articles 38, 39 and 46 (Directive Principles).
• Constitutional priority: The Constitution provides for both, but gives precedence to distributive justice. When women get equal access to resources, the need to compensate them later reduces.
• Why it matters: Empowerment then becomes a matter of right and not a welfare measure, which is the essence of women-led development.

Property Rights – The Foundation of Women-led Development

• Property gives social status, bargaining power at home and a safety net. It is also collateral for loans, which is crucial for enterprise.
• Article 300-A: No person shall be deprived of property except by authority of law. It is a constitutional right (not a Fundamental Right since the 44th Amendment, 1978) and applies equally to men and women.
• Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005: Gave daughters equal coparcenary rights in Hindu joint family property.
• Vineeta Sharma v. Rakesh Sharma (2020): SC held that a daughter is a coparcener by birth, whether or not the father was alive when the 2005 amendment came into force.
• Ground reality: Women hold only about 14% of operational land holdings (Agriculture Census 2015-16). Daughters often ‘give up’ their share under family pressure, and mutation of land records rarely reflects their claims.

How the Shift is Reflected in Recent Policies

1. Political leadership

• Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, 2023 (106th Constitutional Amendment): One-third seats for women in Lok Sabha, State Assemblies and the Delhi Assembly, for 15 years. It will come into effect after delimitation based on the first Census after its commencement.
• Local bodies: Around 46% of elected representatives in Panchayati Raj Institutions are women; many States have raised the reservation to 50%.

2. Asset ownership

• PMAY (Gramin and Urban): Houses registered in the name of the woman or jointly with her.
• PM Jan Dhan Yojana: Over half of the accounts are held by women, bringing them into the formal financial system.

3. Credit and enterprise

• DAY-NRLM: Close to 10 crore rural women organised into about 90 lakh Self-Help Groups.
• Lakhpati Didi: Target of 3 crore SHG women earning at least Rs 1 lakh a year on a sustainable basis.
• Namo Drone Didi: Drones given to women SHGs for agricultural services like spraying fertilisers, turning them into technology service providers.
• Mudra and Stand-Up India: A large majority of Mudra loans have gone to women; Stand-Up India supports women entrepreneurs with loans between Rs 10 lakh and Rs 1 crore.

4. Workforce and leadership in new sectors

• Labour participation: Female LFPR rose from 23.3% (2017-18) to 41.7% (2023-24) as per PLFS.
• Workplace reforms: Maternity benefit raised to 26 weeks (2017); Labour Codes allow women to work night shifts with consent and safeguards.
• Defence and STEM: Permanent Commission for women officers (Babita Puniya case, 2020), entry of women into NDA, and schemes like Vigyan Jyoti for girls in science.

5. Institutional and fiscal support

• Gender Budget: Allocation crossed Rs 4.4 lakh crore in 2025-26, close to 9% of the total Budget.
• Mission Shakti: Combines safety (Sambal – One Stop Centres, Women Helpline) and empowerment (Samarthya – Palna creches, hostels for working women).
• Global push: During its G20 Presidency, India made women-led development a priority, and it was adopted in the New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration.

Why Women are Still Not Empowered

• Patriarchal mindset: The biggest barrier. Women are not yet seen as natural claimants to land, family wealth or leadership positions.
• Proxy leadership: ‘Sarpanch-pati’ or ‘Pradhan-pati’ culture where husbands run the panchayat in the name of elected women.
• Unpaid care burden: Time Use Survey 2024 shows women spend far more time than men on unpaid domestic and care work, which limits paid work.
• Quality of work: Much of the recent rise in female LFPR is in self-employment and unpaid family work in agriculture, not regular salaried jobs.
• Glass ceiling: Global Gender Gap Index 2026 places India at 131st of 145; parity among legislators, senior officials and managers is only 13.1%.
• Weak legal awareness and access to justice: Many women do not know their inheritance rights or how to claim them.
• Digital divide: Lower smartphone and internet use among women limits access to digital credit, markets and schemes.

Way Forward

• Gender-sensitive land records: Digitisation, simple mutation and automatic recording of women’s shares to reduce dependence on middlemen.
• Legal literacy: Campaigns through SHGs and better access to free legal aid under Legal Services Authorities.
• Care infrastructure: Creches near workplaces and industrial clusters, so that women do not have to drop out after marriage or childbirth.
• Move SHGs up the value chain: From microcredit to market linkages, branding, e-commerce and government procurement (e.g., GeM).
• Real authority, not just presence: Training for women representatives, action against proxy leadership, and women heading key committees and ministries.
• Outcome-based gender budgeting: Judge spending by women’s income, assets and leadership, not by money spent alone.
• Role models: Women who have excelled should be placed in leadership roles to show they can run institutions as well as men.

Conclusion: Women’s development made women healthier and more literate. Women-led development must now make them owners, earners and decision-makers. Without this shift, the goal of Viksit Bharat@2047 will remain incomplete, since half the population cannot be left as beneficiaries of growth when they can be its drivers.

Mains Practice Question

Q. “Women-led development is not just an extension of women’s development; it reflects a change in how the State looks at women.” Discuss with reference to recent government initiatives and examine the challenges in making this shift a reality. (15 Marks, 250 words)

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