A distressing fact that has emerged out of the latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) is that sex ratio has fallen drastically in Karnataka from 922 to 910 at birth and from 1,028 to 979 in the adult population compared to the last round.
There is, however, some heartening news on several indicators of women empowerment, even though the rural-urban divide on many counts is stark.
The data shows a sharp increase in the percentage of women who are literate from 59.7 in 2005-06 to 71.7. Predictably, the bigger strides have been made by urban women, at 81.8 per cent when compared to their rural counterparts who are at 63.8 per cent. The percentage of those with 10 years of education has also jumped from 27.8 a decade ago to 45.5.
Fewer child marriages There is good news on marriage and fertility fronts as well. Percentage of girls getting married below the age of 18 has come down dramatically, from 41.2 to 23.2. This drop appears particularly significant when compared to the earlier rounds of the NFHS. For instance, the drop from NFHS-2 to NFHS-3 was by just 4.5 percentage points.
However, a closer look at district-wise figures (not yet available) might be crucial because it is some of the northern districts that have traditionally reported a significantly large number of child marriages, as pointed out by the State-level committee headed by the former Supreme Court judge Shivaraj V. Patil, which submitted its report in 2011.
Decision making The NFHS-4 data for Karnataka also indicates that women have a greater role in decision making in the household and in money transactions.
As opposed to 68.6 per cent who participated in decision making as revealed by the earlier survey, the current one pegs the numbers at 80.4 per cent. Percentage of women with savings accounts they use themselves has gone up from 22.1 to 59.4.
Violence unabated, unpaid work
Quite ironically, while there is reason to cheer on many indicators of the NFHS-4 that point to more number of women being empowered, they face no less violence within their households, suggests the NFHS-4 findings. The latest survey had 20.5 per cent of women reporting spousal violence, as opposed to 20 per cent in the earlier round.
It comes as a surprise that far fewer women said they were paid in cash for work compared to the earlier NFHS. While the figure stood at 34.7 per cent in the last survey, it was only 29.1 in the latest one.
