Job quota for women
The DMK government in Tamil Nadu has taken the bold step of raising the quota for women in government jobs to 40 per cent from the current 30 per cent. Piloting the move in the state assembly, Tamil Nadu’s Finance and Human Resource Management Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan said that it was imperative to increase the quota for women in government jobs to bring in gender equality, which in turn would help usher in change. The reservation will be horizontal in nature, that is, cut across all other vertical reservations, including for SC, ST, BCs, OBCs, etc. While the stated objectives are laudable, any such affirmative action, when limited to only government employment, is more a statement of intent than actually transformative. In fact, according to 2017-18 data – the latest available – women accounted for 33 per cent of state government jobs, while the quota was only 30 per cent. In other words, TN is already exceeding the reserved limit because women are finding jobs on merit in greater numbers than specified under the reservation.
This points to how not only TN but other states can achieve genuine gender parity – greater education and skilling of women to enable them to compete equally in the jobs market. While TN has achieved near universal literacy, and has more women than men enrolled in graduate programmes, they continue to lag in more ‘employable’ areas like technical education and vocational education, with a share of less than 20 per cent. By focusing on not just educating women but equipping them with employable skills, India – not just Tamil Nadu – can truly tap the potential of half the population.
Ford Motors has announced that it will stop manufacturing cars in India because it doesn’t see a clear path to profitability. After spending 25 years, building two manufacturing plants and investing a few billion dollars during this period, it has less than a 2 per cent market share.
Predictably, its announcement has divided opinion right down the middle. For one group, Ford’s exit is one more example of a global investor getting frustrated by the conditions in the country and losing confidence in India as a promising. General Motors and Harley Davidson had already quit the Indian market earlier. The other group is equally vehement that Ford’s exit has little to do with India’s automobile industry’s prospects and reflects the company’s ineptitude in bringing the wrong products in the country.
Both arguments have some merit but they do not capture the whole picture, which is far more complex and which the government needs to ponder and find solutions for.
Ford did make plenty of mistakes in India. It brought in the Escort sedan initially, which was not suitable for the stage at which the Indian market was then. It never managed to get the pulse of the consumer. The bulk of the Indian market lay in smaller cars – the A and B class vehicles. After a decade and a half, the C-class sedans managed to get reasonable volumes. And now, the hot selling items are small UVs. Ford had a limited line-up in these segments though it tried with the Ikon, Fiesta, Focus and the Ecosport SUV. But these were a poor match for the offerings of Maruti and Hyundai, which are stronger in problems meeting the demand for its highly profitable and hot-selling F-150 pick-up trucks in the US. With global supply chains disrupted, it made little sense to continue burning money in a market that had never lived up to its promise, especially when it was also spending money in restructuring its operations for the future. The slowdown in the Indian economy over the last three years and the fact that the automobile market seemed to have left behind its days of rapid YoY growth only made the decision
Much before Ford decided to walk away, General Motors had already quit. Toyota and Honda too have scaled down their efforts, with Toyota actually trying to ride on Maruti’s coattails in India with cross-badged products
cars and UVs in India would find it difficult to meet safety norms in western countries. It has also ensured that two players control 70 per cent of the market, leaving the other 10-odd to scrabble for the rest. As a result, Toyota, VolkswagenSkoda and even Nissan-Renault have minuscule shares. Tata Motors, of late, has managed a respectable showing after over a decade of misses. High petrol prices and policy fluctuations in emission and other things have also played a role.