She is a Scientist

Context: The Department of Science and Technology is drawing up a policy to rank institutes based on the proportion of women employed. It is a welcome step and will require concerted efforts to make the workplace inclusive for women scientists in India 

Challenges faced by women in science:

• Low representation: As per the Indian Academy of Sciences, women representation at various levels has been abysmally low.

• Indian scientific institutions collectively employ only 15% women even as women form 37% of PhD holders and accounted for 40% of university enrolment in science subjects in 2001. --The Report of the National Task Force for Women in Science.
• The Indian National Science Academy had only 5% elected women fellows in their ranks between 2001-2014 (a 12- year period considered as one-third of the formal employment period in women's scientific career). 

• Multiple Burdens: Drop in the number of women in science happens at the stages following graduation.

• Women are burdened with dual challenges of professional and domestic responsibilities. 

• Faces a Young Researcher's Challenges: Building a motivated team and attracting consistent funding are the two main challenges that any young researcher faces, including women.

• Administrative challenges at the workplace, uncertainty regarding safe travel and help in caring for children and ageing parents at the home front, are few additional challenges faced by women.

• These challenges put women's focus on publications since they are perceived as an objective criterion to judge a scientist.
• However, scientific ideas grow and take form through interactions and immersive experiences away from the lab and home help in developing fresh, creative and contemporary projects. 
• Unintended consequences of "women-friendly" policies: 

• In some institutes, to ensure their safety, women are advised to work only during official hours, while men can access labs any time. 

• On the other hand, best research institutions create spaces for mixing and mingling, ironing out stereotypes and perceptions of being the "other" group. 

• While the Maternity Benefit Act made it mandatory for establishing a creche facility at the workplace, it is unaffordable for students and post-doctoral fellows since all the costs were to be borne by the users.

• Two-Body Problem: There exists an informal practice at many institutes to avoid hiring couples, which forces couples to put one career before another to ensure at least one stable job. 

• Reluctance among the experimentalists to leave the facilities: that they have built up from scarce resources with time and care. 

• This reduces opportunities for many women in their late ages to enjoy flexibilities in their career paths.

Way Forward:

• Prepare Inclusive Institutes: The policy must aim to prepare institutions to ensure a diverse and inclusive workplace for women in science. 

• Prioritize young families for on-campus housing by revamping the current seniority-based system and workplace transport facility in cities.
• Ensure workplace creche facilities and extend the childcare leave, like the leave travel concession, to either parent, to reduce burden shared by the women.

• CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology demonstrates that the creche system can become sustainable, affordable for all and provide employment opportunities to more women.
• Increase Mobility: Institutes around the country can benefit from increased mobility of senior academics. 

• By creating a metric for the valuation of resources, and a channel for inter-institutional mobility, cross-fertilization of ideas, technical expertise and resources can ensue. 
• Flexibility in switching career paths: It will create a much-needed flux between academic institutes, government and private industries.

• Change in the approach to conferences: by adopting a rewards-based system.

• • For, E.g. by supporting and rewarding organizers who ensure greater participation of women, we can ensure higher participation and present networking opportunities for women.
  • Women will especially benefit from moving such discussions from alumni networks and informal clubs to the open format of conference sessions.

• Policy Suggestions:

• New policy should apply to private institute also: apart from government institutes. 
• Placing the burden of reversing long-standing inequalities and ensuring inclusivity only on government-funded institutions, will put them at a great disadvantage in a competitive arena. 

• New policies should be sensitive to ground-level realities: It will bring "inclusivity, equity and diversity" in our scientific institutions.

• Committees and organizations have to be sensitized, and implementation ensured through periodic evaluations of outcomes.
• Making the data regarding publicly funded projects widely available will allow an analysis of factors beyond equality in numbers, by asking deeper questions, like what percentage of funding goes to women scientists at various levels. 
• Avoid poorly thought out, and haphazardly implemented policies that focus on mere ratings and rankings can backfire. 

Conclusion: Ensuring equality without compromising the quality of research, by creating an environment of individual freedom and institutional trust, requires a concerted effort from policymakers, institutions and individuals.