Unpacking the Assumption of Gender Neutrality: Akshaya Project of the Kerala IT Mission in India

Abstract

Programs and projects that are not targeted to specific population groups often implicitly assume that they have no adverse distributional effects. However, this is hardly ever the case, especially if the intended beneficiary groups are not reasonably homogeneous. There is increasing recognition in development circles that in the absence of informed affirmative action, inequalities in income distribution and human resources can seriously distort the distribution of project outcomes of seemingly neutral projects. Gender experts have been suggesting that similar kinds of distortions can arise also across gender divides, but this has not translated into restructured project designs in any substantive ways. This article is based on a study of a high-profile ICT (Information and Communication Technology) Project of the Kerala (a Southern Indian state) IT Mission—Akshaya. The study finds that there are indeed varied kinds of gender differences in the impact of the project, and that the differences are pretty sharply defined, especially within the entrepreneur group. It also suggests that with a somewhat greater degree of gender sensitivity and some flexibility in the project design, some of the problems that women entrepreneurs have been facing could have been addressed without much trouble even within the existing project design.