Gender Budgeting In India- An Appraisal: With Special Reference to the Ministry of Women and Child Development

Abstract

Gender Budgeting is an important tool by which gender issues are incorporated in the macro economy policy framework to address concerns related to gender empowerment and gender inequalities. Indian government has been working on matters related to gender since 1997-98 but big impetus was provided by including gender budget statement in the budget from 2005-06 onwards. In order to assess and analyse gender budgeting in India, it is pertinent to evaluate the performance of the nodal agency in India. Keeping this in view, the paper analysed trends in budgetary allocations to the Ministry, distribution of the allocations among various programmes and shifting focus of the ministry during the period 1997-98 to 2015-16. The paper found that there are too many schemes but with low allocations. There is an urgent need to revitalize and re-engineer the whole process of gender budgeting and gender sensitization by the Ministry.

1. Introduction