The Covid-19 outbreak brought attention to how crucial mobile devices and mobile internet connectivity are for information, healthcare, education, e-commerce, financial services, and income generation. According to the Mobile Gender Gap Report, 2022 by GSMA, a global organisation that promotes digital inclusion, the pandemic also “highlighted the stark digital difference,” in which individuals without access to mobile internet “are at risk of being left even further behind,”.

When the pandemic struck, women’s employment in India was already in free fall. According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, an estimated 21 million women dropped out of the labour force between 2017 and 2020. The pandemic had a disproportionate impact on women’s employment. Women lost more jobs than men in percentage terms. According to data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, the labour force in India had shrunk by 13% for women and 2% for men by the end of 2020.

However, earlier in 2021, the Periodic Labour Force Survey found women’s labour force participation to be at 32.5%, the highest level in four years. However, this was largely due to an increase in rural women’s labour force participation and the fact that economic distress was forcing women to accept even low-wage jobs.

The digital gender gap in India is primarily the result of three factors. The first is a rural-urban divide; rural women are less likely to own mobile phones than urban Indian women. Even among urban women, digital payments, a fundamental step towards digital adaptation, are more common among organised than unorganised female workers. The high cost of data and services prevents unorganised urban workers from taking advantage of them.

The second type of divide is based on income. According to Mitali Nikore of Nikore Associates, an economics research group, accessing data can cost low-income households up to 3% of their monthly income. The third category is social norms. In a society where mobile phones are viewed as a risk to women’s reputations before marriage and an interruption to caregiving responsibilities after marriage, women’s online activity is frequently governed by rudimentary and authoritative patriarchal values.

According to a 2021 study titled “The digital efficacy of women micro and nano entrepreneurs across India” conducted by the Digital Empowerment Foundation, a Delhi-based organisation that promotes digital literacy, 82% of the 636 women who owned and managed their own businesses were not digitally literate. The study included 10,000 women from Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Haryana, both rural and urban. Furthermore, 80% of women said they had never used a payment system such as PayTM, Google Pay, or Bharat Interface for Money.

Digital literacy must assume the top priority for the policymakers. However, achieving basic literacy for all is one of the most important first steps towards achieving digital literacy for all. According to the National Survey of India, India’s literacy rate in 2022 is 77.7%. Just about 2 in 10 Indians were literate back in the year 1950, however, the figures have nearly doubled in the year 2022. From a literacy rate of 18.3% in 1951 to 77.7% in 2022, India has made great strides towards becoming a well-educated nation. Though male and female literacy rates have risen over the years, the wide gender gap prevails even today. As per the National Survey of India, India’s male literacy rate is 82.4% and female literacy rate is 65.8%. 

The lack of basic literacy inevitably means that women are denied opportunities in a labour market where digital skills are in demand. Women could have benefited from hybrid work, which requires phones or laptops as well as digital literacy. However, they were unable to take these jobs due to less than advanced digital skills. With the digitization of payments, inventory management, and marketing, new jobs were created, however, women are slow to take on these positions.

Unless and until India’s women are able to catch up, and catch up quickly, to bridge the existing gap, it will continue to affect their prospects for entrepreneurship, limiting women-run businesses to low-tech, low-revenue-generating sectors such as food and handicrafts with few opportunities for growth. 

To address these challenges and promote women’s entrepreneurship, India needs to implement policies and initiatives that support women’s education, training, and access to finance and markets. Additionally, it is crucial to address cultural and social norms that discourage women’s participation in the economy and limit their mobility and decision-making power.

By promoting women’s entrepreneurship and bridging the gender gap, India can unlock significant economic potential, driving job creation, innovation, and sustainable economic growth.