Women, Business and the Law Report 2023

According to the World Bank’s (WB) Women, Business and the Law report 2023 – an index on the life cycle of a working woman, India’s score dropped to 74.4 out of 100.

What is ‘Women, Business and the Law Report, 2023’?

• It is a World Bank Group project collecting data on the laws and regulations that affect women’s economic opportunity.
• It is committed to informing research and policy discussions about the state of women’s economic opportunities and empowerment.
• It demonstrates the progress made while emphasising the work still to be done to ensure economic empowerment for all.
• Since 2009, the project has aided economies to achieve gender equality and hence become more resilient.
• It covers 190 economies and eight topics relevant to women’s economic participation and the 2023 report measures the legal differences on access to economic opportunities between men and women.
• A score of 100 on the Index means that women are on an equal standing with men on all the eight indicators being measured.
• In the 2023 index only 14 (Belgium, Canada, Denmark, etc) economies scored a perfect 100.

What is the India specific findings in the WBL Report 2023?

• For India, the Index used data on the laws and regulations applicable in Mumbai, viewed as the country’s main business city.
• The laws affecting the Indian working woman’s pay, pension, work after having children, starting and running a business, property and inheritance, do not provide for equality with Indian men, dragging India’s score down to 74.4.
• India scored higher than the 63.7 average for the South Asian region, though lower than Nepal which had the region’s highest score of 80.6.
• India gets a perfect score, when it comes to constraints on freedom of movement, laws affecting women’s decisions to work and constraints related to marriage.
• Reforms needed — To improve on the Pay indicator, India may wish to consider —
  • • Mandating equal remuneration for work of equal value,
    • Allowing women to work at night in the same way as men, and
    • Allowing women to work in an industrial job in the same way as men.