women access to internet communcation … · viding the way to organize and store notes, reference...

WOMEN ACCESS TO INTERNETAND INFORMATION

COMMUNCATION TECHNOLOGY:AN INDIAN PERSPECTIVE

Dr. Sushma Rani11Assistant Professor,School of Education,

Lovely Professional University,Phagwara, Jalandhar (Pb.)

January 15, 2018

Abstract

The aim of this research paper is to present and discussthe computer and internet accessibility concept towards ac-cessing to the computer and internet information structureto woman in India. The problems and issues related towomen access to internet and information communciationtechnology have discussed significantly in order to exploremore technolgoy-based learning among women working invarious sectors of the society nationally as well as interna-tionally.

Key Words : Information and Communication Tech-nology (ICT), Internet.

1 INTRODUCTION

India is situated in the Southern Asian part occupied greater part ofIndian subcontinent having current population of India as 1,288,816,921

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International Journal of Pure and Applied MathematicsVolume 118 No. 16 2018, 723-733ISSN: 1311-8080 (printed version); ISSN: 1314-3395 (on-line version)url: http://www.ijpam.euSpecial Issue ijpam.eu

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(1.28 billion) (est. 01 Nov, 2015) with total male population con-sisted of 665,545,058, (665 million), total female population around623,271,862,(623 million) and sex ratio around 943 females per1,000 males. The age structure of India is around 50% of Indiascurrent population lies under the age group of 0-25 years. Cur-rently, there are about 51 births in India in a minute. Indian isa multicultural, multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, multi-traditional coun-try, characterized by the distinct values and norms about manyissues including the role of women in Indian society. Besides En-glish and Hindi languages, there are other official languages that arecurrently being used in many regions. In some regions languagessuch as Bengali, Gujrati, Marathi, Telgu and Urdu are used as thefirst-language.

During colonial interventions that began in the late 17th centuryunder the British empire, the East India company administeredBengal in 1765. After 1858 Indian Mutiny the crown took overcompanys authority and in 1876 Queen Victoria was proclaimedEmpress of India. Indian won independence in 1947 at the sametime the Indian partitioned took place where Pakistan being estab-lished mainly from the Muslim territories in the north-east (nowBangladesh) and the north-west. Further, the word India comesfrom a Latin Greek word named as Indos, which is named after aRiver name Indu, from Persian hind, from Sanskrit sindhu river.India is a second most populous country in the world and also amember of Commonwealth.

Indian women have significantly showed remarkable participa-tion and effective contribution in various domains of life includingmoral, social, spiritual and economical development of the coun-try. This was made possible by the Indian government and policystandpoint which considered women as a prestigious component fornational development agenda. In coming future Indian will be con-sidered as one of the most developing country in the Asia. There hasbeen past decades that showed drastic growth in gender equality,but in some parts there is still a challenge faced by Indian womensrelated to certain disciplines.

Under gender benchmarking studies, the studies conducted lastyear with reference to advancement of women in science and tech-nology. The countrys evidences were reported for the countriesIndia, US, European Union, South Africa, South Korea, Indonesia

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and Brazil. But the results from the studies showed that Indianstood in the lowest among all seven countries with lowest partici-pation of female access to computer internet resources, economicalrelated issues, and health aspects. It was also found that less than15% of women have access to their own bank account, and less thana third to hold the available managerial and administrative power.

Moreover, about 200 million countrys users used internet, thusgrowing at a fast rate. Today India rank as the worlds secondlargest market in the world after China, likely overtook UnitedStates. From Indian Internet statistical data it was found thatone-third of the Indian women are online users.

According to Google India managing director, Ragan Anandanreported that about the problems and limitations regarding easyaccess to Internet, lack of knowledge on how to use the Internetand its relevance in their daily lives, which are the now the biggestbarriers for women to get online. Helping women get online is aninitiative that aims to overcome these barriers and empower womento improve their lives. With this initiative we are aiming to help50 million additional women to get online by end of 2014 by under-taking a variety of initiatives across India. Google India recentlytook the initiative of providing help to computer and access to webthrough its website www.hwgo.com. both in Hindi and Englishlanguage under Helping women get online scheme. The scheme in-volved mass media campaign through awareness for women acrossthe country regarding access to internet and technology.

Fig. no-1: Showing Indias rank towards overall internet usage

Source: Internet World Stats- www.internetworldstats.com/top20.htmAround 3,270,490,584 estimated internet users for June 30, 2015

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Thus in this way the internet access may provides individualsto link, expand and express their views, thoughts and knowledge tocommunity and experts or can be used for educational or employ-ment purpose. There by increasing social, economical development.

In the same way the extensive use of ICT and internet in In-dia, women have been found to have benefitted from various ICTstechnologies. However the computer and internet knowledge infor-mation and accessibility are well known to them. The present re-search paper emphasizes knowledge and access to ICT and internet-info structure to women in India. The Indian women accessibilitytowards computer and internet (including ICT) is presented anddiscussed through a framework.

2 INTERNET AWARENESS

In India according to worlds statistics data the total number ofinternet users are 300 million internet users, 23% internet penetra-tion, and the overall population of India is 1.24 billion, where theoverall growth in internet users is 14%. In India the 62% are urbansubscribers whereas its only 38% subscribers in rural regions.

The initiatives are still taking by government in favour rural de-velopment towards digital communication technology. It is decidedto connect 2,50,000 gram panchayats in the country with accessthem to 100 mbps broadband facility provided with e-governanceservices such as telemedicine, tele-education, tele-teaching etc. throughNational Optical Fibre Network (NOFN). Under rural Indian con-nectivity mission, in the next coming five years 46,288 villages willcome under mobile connectivity and about 8,621 villages in NorthEast states with installation of 321 mobile towers.

Inidans approach to facilitate women participation towards glob-alization and modernization is charactized into 3 phases:

1. Access : Developing ICT information structure and internetaccess to everyone.

2. Adoption: Promoting regualr and widespread use of ICTsin eveydays daily life

3. Inclusion : Ensuing ICTs based socio-economical values toaii under reserved Indians.

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The fig. no.1 shows the statistical data among top 20 countriesaround the world. From the table it is very much clear that theIndias rank stood 2nd throughout the whole world. The overall per-centage growth in during the year (2000-2015) in terms of Internetusers is 6,980.0%. The overall internet users during year 2015 Juneis 354,000,000 while it was just around 5,000,000 during year 200,which is really a drastic increase in overall percentage of internetusers. Also, it is quite obvious from fig. no-2 that 49.2% countriesare layered under top 20 countries, 45% countries assumed to comeunder worlds average internet usage while 36.3% comes under restof world.

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The internet usage in terms of demographic variables such asmale and female, the male uses 61% of internet use, while 39%females have access to internet usage in India. The oveall onlineshopping during occassiosn, festivals etc. the internet access formale is 67% whilst for female it is just 33%. It is further seen fromthe case study being studeis by Mark Zuckeberg while studyingthe problem Why male denomination in India is Mark Zuckerbergproblem too?. The Marck Zuckerberg results stated In the statesfor every men for every woman sex ratio of Indians on Facebookusers in Bihar, Gujrat and Rajasthan shows worst. But the statesmentioned above i.e. Bihar, Gujrat and Rajasthan are not worst forover-all-sex-ratio of Indias total population in the census 2011. Outof Union Territories, Andaman and Nicobar islands are even worsethat those other states, although the best sex ratio is surprisingly inthe Northern Eastern states. On the other hand the Mizoram statehas 137 men for every 100 women, thus it will be best for the womento be on the Facebook. The Tripura state, which is the Bengali-dominated, is glaring exception one. The other states such as Delhi,Kerela, West Bengal and Goa shows considerable better than thenational average. The Inidan cities having more than million pop-ulation like Bhilwandi Thane in Maharashtra shows the worst interms of sex-ratio of Facebook users in Indian cities. BhilwandiThane (Maharashtra) has six men for every women on Facebook.On the other hand the worst cities in this regard are all in westernIndia, whereas among all the best three cities are all in Kerela. TheFig. no-3, shows the

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3 Do Indian women have access to Com-

puters and ICT?

Access is defined as the ability to use a computer for prolongedperiod of time (Spennemann, 1996). According to Spenneman, theuse of World Wide Web (WWW), however, does not require owinga computer, but merely access to use. If access and use of IT isdirectly linked to social and economical development, then it is verynecessary that woman in developing countries understands the im-portance of these technologies and learns to use them (Balasingam,in press).

Information communication technology (ICT) and computersare the powerful resources, tools and aids to learning thereby pro-viding the way to organize and store notes, reference and materi-als; providing the tool to present work via word processing, powerpoint presentation, pictorial presentation including graphic charts,

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histograms, and frequency distribution tables; equipments for cap-turing real-life experiences through digital cameras, document cam-era, scanners and 3-D technological devices or through enormouslibrary information access through World Wide Web represents.Thus, through ICT that ensures womens better preservation andtransfer of knowledge and skills through the advent of informa-tion and communication technologies, women are ensured not toleft behind, this time in the information revolution. ICT promoteswomen of empowerment in certain aspects in terms of reducinggender inequalities and enhances maximum women participation invarious spheres of life. Effort have been put forward by the Indiangovernment to improve and enhance the participation of womenaccess to internet and technology in order to establish informedand computer-literate society. The initiatives incorporated vari-ous training and special skill development programs, free coachingclasses etc. towards enhancing women access to ICT and comput-ers.

Women and Computer Access In India number of programsand initiatives have been incorporated to enhance computer acces-sibility. This initiative promotes universal access to large masses.

4 Health status

India rank 5th in health status, ICT played an important role insupporting health care towards remote areas. Thereby using ICTin health sector declines various disease such malaria, viral andHIV/AIDS diseases are dropping to a larger extend.

5 Social Status

India has remarkable growth for women development in terms oftheir social status. But still today in some regions of India crimeagainst increases due to rise in kidnapping, molestation and rape.From Indian statistics it is found that women works for longer hourthan men while men works for long hours at paid work. Statisticallyfurther, it has been found that men devoted 3.6 hours in performinghousehold activities and care-related works as compared to 34.6hours for women in India.

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6 Economic Status

In economical sector women position is also remarkable. For ex-ample around 29% of women as compared to 80% men involved informal labor work. Whist the percentage for women in agriculturesector is quite more 20% more women than men around 65% to46% as found in the statistical data. Among the world percent-age, the highest percentage is found for the women working in theagriculture sector but for both men and women the percentage isfalling down constantly.

7 Access to resources

Indian legislation supports full right to womens access to indepen-dent bank accounts and bank loans, land and property access etc.But these laws are often somewhere ignored, just 15% exercise thisright.

8 Women in office

Indian women showed remarkable increase in parliament and minis-terial positions. However, at the villages (panchayat) level, womenoccupied 36% to 37% of the three tiers of Panchayati Raj , lead-ership positions, both young and elder women in rural areas areprovided with the leadership and monitoring power authority inthe villages. Thus, in India there is fairly increase in high contra-ceptive rate of their increase in official and monitoring issues.

9 Education and literacy

The women literacy is increased drastically to higher heights in thelast few years. The girls and females enrollment in various spheresof life such as school and college education, professional or technicalareas and research areas have increased on large scale. Accordingto CEDAW, With the principle of gender equality enshrined in theIndian Constitution, India has signed and implemented a numberof national and international conventions and laws relating to the

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rights of women, including the UN Convention on the Eliminationof All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

The national researcher Dr. Sudha Nair (India) Gender Ad-visory Board of the United Nations Commission on Science andTechnology for Development stated that The study was timely andunique,” she said. ”The report will help policy makers to designbetter programs, to be more inclusive in their development ap-proaches, and address the need to get gender-disaggregated data.”InIndia in 1992, National Commission for women was establishedwith a mission to empower Indian women in different aspects oflife. In this way during 2010 on International Womens Day, theNational Mission for Empowerment of Women (NMEW) was es-tablished by the government of India which aims to strengthen all-around-development of women. Also, it has mandate to strengtheninter-sectoral collaboration and cooperation and facilitate coordi-nation among all women’s programs across ministries and depart-ments throughout the globe.

10 Conclusion

Since the women position according to Indian statistics is apprecia-ble and admirable. The ICT, internet and technology have playeda significant role towards signs of progress. Thus the strategy mustbe established to fill ll the gap if any to ensure maximum partici-pation of women in India to support them to access the resourcesand opportunities in order to contribute to Indias knowledge.

From Indias policy environment it is very much clear that womenparticipation in accessing internet and ICTs are very much positive,being necessity to increase substantially before women get benefitfrom the innovation and advantages.

References

[1] www.internetworldstats.com/top20.htm.

[2] http://scroll.in/article/682809/why-male-domination-in-india-is-mark-zuckerbergs-problem-too.

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