Background

Despite the growing awareness and public initiative toward inclusion and diversity, disabled women from underprivileged socio-economic backgrounds continue to face barriers in accessing meaningful employment opportunities in India. Only about 23% of Indian women with disabilities participate in employment. The systems of gender, disability and class intertwine while limiting their access to education, skills training, and livelihood opportunities. This often results in unemployment and economic dependency among disabled women at a very disproportionate rate. Although in recent years we have seen an increase in the policy frameworks around disability inclusion, persons with disabilities comprise less than 1% of the workforce  in Indian companies. This has a disproportionately negative impact on women, whose workforce participation is already significantly lower.

For many disabled women, their access to regular employment ecosystems gets constrained by physical inaccessibility, rigid workplace norms and limited employer awareness. These ecosystems are based on a narrow understanding of productivity which tends to exclude non-normative bodies and modes of work. This leads to these barriers being further compounded for women associated with community-based NGOs, as skilling initiatives often end up fragmented, under-resourced, or misaligned with actual labour market opportunities. This results in disabled women being permanently excluded from the labour force and thereby remaining dependent upon their families for financial support. 

It is important to understand that many alternative employment models such as flexible remote work, or craft and skill based work, remain underutilised despite their potential to create employment opportunities for a diverse range of individuals. There is a gap in structured linkages between grassroots organisations, disability-aware employers willing to provide necessary skills, and women seeking such opportunities. This gap persists in our society despite there being enough evidence that targeted skilling, infrastructural support, and employer sensitisation can encourage a social-economic integration for disabled women.