Despite Talk of Diversity, Women Still a Minority in Indian Boardrooms
Gender parity in Indian boardrooms continues to remain elusive, with a decline in the number of women occupying key positions in public sector boardrooms over the past year, data has revealed.
According to data from primeinfobase.com, a mere 19% of total directorships are held by women in the private sector while 14.3% in the public sector for Nifty 500 companies, as of March 6.
While there has been a marginal increase in the number of women in private sector directorships, rising from 759 in March 2023 to 799 in 2024, the public sector witnessed a decrease from 85 to 84 directorships during the same period. Consequently, the public sector’s share of directorships fell from 14.7% to 14.3%, Business Standard reported.
This marks a wider gender gap compared to the previous year, with women facing challenges in heading crucial board committees, the report said.
The gender disparity extends to board committees, where women find themselves in the minority, holding approximately 14% of positions in risk management and over 20% in the nomination and remuneration committee. Meanwhile men occupy around eight out of 10 board committee positions.
However, a large number of board rooms are due for a shuffle this year as The Companies Act, which came into force in 2014, mandates a 10-year term for independent directors. This means as companies refresh their boards this year, they will have an opportunity to achieve at least 30% representation of women in boardrooms.
Without this, the target of 30% gender diversity in the boardroom will only be met by 2058 at the current pace, the report said.
“We might see an uptick as a consequence. While it is important to look at women’s representation across the board, another metric would be to look at women in the workforce. This indicator would be helpful to understand gender diversity at a broader level — not just for the company, but the economy,” Amit Tandon, founder and managing director of IiAS told Business Standard.
According to data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, only 11.1% of working-age Indian women were employed or seeking employment as of February 2024, compared to a 68.1% labor force participation rate for men.
Meanwhile, data from Deloitte Global Boardroom Program’s Women in the Boardroom report shows that only 5.1% of the CEOs in the 400 listed companies on the MSCI index are women. This figure stood at 3.4% in 2018, the Economic Times reported
The report also pointed out that the 400 companies have a total of 524 women directors. This includes those companies that only fulfil the condition of having one woman director, implying that it’s just a ticking-the-box exercise.
“Organisations have to address the issue at the bottom of the pyramid by including equal number of women right at the fresher level,” Wipro chief financial officer Aparna Iyer told the Economic Times.
“Then they have to retain the women through their toughest and key life stages such as maternity and care giving. It is crucial then that organisations proactively build a robust leadership pipeline,” she added.
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