Understanding Women’s Autonomy and Gender Role attitudes in Jharkhand: A comparative Analysis of NFHS 3 Data

The present study seeks to explore major constructs of gender role attitude among women in Jharkhand and it also seems to examine various contexts of women’s autonomy. Thus this study examines the distribution and correlates of two different dimensions of women’s empowerment among women age 15-49 in Jharkhand. These dimensions are women’s participation in household decision-making and their attitude regarding specific inequalities in gender roles. Data used for present study is taken from third round of National Family Health survey (NFHS 3). Jharkhand state file has been used for the present analysis; where women age 15-49 were interviewed in all 2,483 sampled household therefore, information from 2,983 women’s were obtained. In order to ascertain data requirements and articulation of various issues pertaining to gender role attitude and women’s autonomy this paper uses applications of bi-variate and multivariate techniques. Results shows that Women in Jharkhand are disadvantaged absolutely and relative to men in terms of access to education, media exposure, and employment for cash. The majority of married women do not have the final say on the use of their own earnings or all other household decisions asked about. Traditional gender norms, particularly those concerning wife beating, remain strongly entrenched.