India is home to 17 percent of women globally. While India is the world’s largest democracy and can boast many women in powerful leadership positions, including historic female Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who served for 15 years across two terms, today only 25 percent of women in India are part of the workforce. India ranks 123rd out of 162 nations on the UN Gender Inequality Index. Globally, 1 in 3 women experience domestic violence according to the WHO, but India’s numbers are expected to be even higher.

These are troubling statistics for female representation in India, and there is some precedent for them. While the earliest Hindu deities were female—probably because back then childbirth was a miracle and women were worshipped as a consequence—women soon moved into the shadow of men to become a “plus one”.

In Hindu mythology, Vishnu is the preserver of the universe. His wife, Lakshmi, is the enabler, the “plus one”. She is powerful and represents wealth, prosperity, luck—all the things that enable a good life—yet Vishnu remains at the centre.

In India’s history, there are women who have made their mark, but they have remained largely in the shadows. For example, during the Mughal rule of India, Empress Nur Jahan, wife of Emperor Jehangir, was one such woman. While she was beautiful, her husband was said to have loved her for her intelligence and competence, and many historians claim that without her Jehangir’s rule would have been far shorter as she was the true power behind the throne.

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In modern India, there are many powerful female leaders, from Mamata Banerjee, currently the chief minister of West Bengal, to Falguni Nayar, CEO of beauty and lifestyle retailer Nykaa, which was valued at nearly $13 billion in 2021. Yet, of the 25 percent women active in India’s workforce, fewer than five percent are CEOs.

Most Indian women choose to take a back seat, often due to involuntary pressures that arise from their responsibilities, upbringing and societal expectations about the role they should play. Indian steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal of ArcelorMittal, who ranks among the richest and most influential people in the world, publicly credits 100 percent of his success to his wife, Usha, yet she remains out of the spotlight.

While some men recognise and acknowledge the role that women play in their lives, including Emperor Jehangir and Mittal, this is not the case for the majority with others going to the opposite extreme and disrespecting women by abusing them physically and emotionally. This is borne out in India’s domestic violence figures.

The issue is not really about equal roles, but a lack of respect for the woman’s role. As men and women, we are inherently different. Consider the lion and the hyena in the jungle. The two cover the same ground, hunt the same prey, and scavenge the same remains of animals, but they are different. Lions are strong and deadly, while hyenas may not be as physically strong but are intelligent and fierce. Hyenas understand that a lion might be a better hunter, so they closely track a lion’s movement, let it hunt for its prey, and then strategically outnumber it, approaching the lion as a pack and stealing its prey. Hyenas play the same hunting game but with different rules.

As women, like the hyena, we need to realise and recognise our strengths and play to them. We need to play the game, but change the rules.

Inherently, women are multitaskers. A working mother is essentially working three jobs: mother, homemaker and office worker or professional. Women also have a higher emotional quotient and use emotion as a guiding force when raising their children. From a recruitment standpoint, some might incorrectly view these traits as weaknesses: a woman already has so many other roles that work might not be her sole focus, or she is highly emotional and therefore tougher to manage.

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On the contrary, as multitaskers women display diverse leadership skills in managing teams and high adaptability to unpredictable situations, which leads to agility in decision making and an outcome-driven approach. They know how to prioritise and how to work beyond the standard playbook to get the job done. Take the prime minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern. As a prime minister with a small child, she changed the rules around bringing her child to work, including taking her then-three-month-old to an address she was giving at the United Nations General Assembly, and displayed her adaptability while streaming a nationwide address from Facebook Live during which she was interrupted by her toddler. Her strength as a mother of adapting to unforeseen situations helped her in particular in the handling of the Christchurch shootings and the pandemic, successes which contributed to her re-election for a second term. As a working mother, Ardern changed the rules on how a prime minister leads a nation to help her balance both of her roles. As a woman she brought the same passion to her work as she brought to raising her children and redefined what it means to be a successful leader and a parent.

Having equal representation of women is necessary in all realms: half the world is female and they must be equally represented to bring about balance in society, as in the jungle where we need all species to thrive to maintain the delicate ecological balance of nature. How do we bring women back to the centre, both in India and globally, to level the scales?

The obvious answer? We need to educate both men and women: men about the important role that a woman can play in their lives and in the workforce, and women about the power they actually hold. We need to re-look at our school curriculum with a gender sensitive lens, bringing in a fresh way of thinking in young children. In this highly digital world, we need more role models, both men and women, who publicly take a stand empowering and accrediting women for the role they play. India is making strides in the right direction with its new National Education Policy 2020, which aims to address gender inequity, but seeing it move into implementation is a difficult and distant journey.

While education is the best long-term solution, we need to address the various issues that contribute to the problem. When it comes to the lack of respect for women and the abuse they experience, the number one reason women don’t leave a toxic, violent relationship is because of their financial dependence. Finding ways to make Indian women financially independent is the answer. This involves making women more employable, educating them, upskilling them and encouraging them to work. We need to empower them financially, teach them how to earn and manage their finances. Financial dependence of women has proven to be the number one reason women aren’t able to escape an abusive relationship.  

Besides ensuring women are gaining financial independence through jobs suited to their strengths, we need to protect them financially through legislation too.