Gender budgeting to empower women

The national budget impacts the lives of women in many ways. It can directly promote women’s development when funds are allocated for programmes that address their economic, social and other needs. This was the crux of a workshop on ‘Gender Responsive Budgeting,’ hosted by School of Gender and Development Studies, on February 21.

The workshop, supported by the Ministry of Women and Child Development (MWCD), was aimed at sensitising men and women working in the University about gender mainstreaming, and disseminating the nuances of Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB) and exposing its advantages amongst the participants.

Officials from MWCD conducted the workshop to create awareness amongst the decision-making personnel of IGNOU regarding mainstreaming of women by using Gender Budgeting (GB) as a tool.

The workshop was followed by three technical sessions hosted by Dr Paramita Majumdar from MWCD, Prof Asha Kapur Mehta, the Indian Institute of Public Administration, and Dr Swapna Bisht, Trainer, Gender Budgeting, in the presence of Pro-VCs Prof Parvin Sinclair and Prof P.R. Ramanujam. While delivering the keynote address, Dr Vinita Agarwal, Director, GB, MWCD, said, “GB is a tool to translate gender commitments into budgetary commitments. It is an ongoing process which doesn’t seek a separate budget. It is a tool to analyse if government and public sector budgets are prepared and spent keeping gender perspective in mind.”

The Ministry of Finance recognised the potential for gender budgeting and mandated all the ministries to establish Gender Budgeting Cells by January 2005. It asked 18 ministries and departments to submit a report highlighting budgetary allocations for women.