Sunday, 13 Oct, 2024
By: Yash Gupte
India Tracker takes a look at Iran's position on different Global Indicators particularly concerning women amid the nationwide protests.
Iran has not only caught the attention of the whole world but also the international inter-governmental organizations as the nation has been facing the wrath of largscale anti-hijab protests led by Iranian women amid 22 year old Mahasa Amini's death. Apart from the protests, Tehran has been already facing the wrath of the west as the latter has been imposing a number of economic sanctions. A new wave of sanctions have been lashed at Tehran by the United States of America following the heavy crackdown on the protestors.
India Tracker takes a look at Iran's position on different Global Indicators particularly concerning women amid the nationwide protests.
Mahasa Amini was detained by the Iranian Morality Police in the nation's capital, Tehran as she was found violating the Islamic code of covering her head with the Hijab. Upon detention and later arrest, she collapsed at the police station and died three days later.
As soon as the news of her death was made public, in the most significant threat to Iran's leadership since the 2009 Green Movement uprising, young women marched in the streets and publicly chopped off their hair in response to her death, sparking demonstrations in dozens of cities around the country. The Iranian forces heavily cracked down on the protestors and arrested more than 1900 people and estimates by various human rights organisations across the world alleged that more than 150 people have been killed by the Iranian forces during the nationwide protests.
Iran was positioned at the 143rd rank on the World Economic Forum's Gender Gap Index, although it ranks 144th in terms of economic involvement with a score of 0.343, 142nd in terms of political empowerment with a score of 0.036, 118th in terms of health and survival (score: 0.964), and 106th in terms of educational attainment with a score of 0.963. According to a different survey released on June 23 by The Economist's research and analysis division, the Economist intelligence unit, Tehran ranks 163rd out of 173 cities in the Global Liveability Index.
According to the Human Rights Watch, the unemployment rate has been much higher in women at above 20% in recent years as compared to men (9.5%). Only 5.6% of the parliamentarians in the Islamic Republic of Iran are women. In 2019, women constituted 5.9% of the total members in the Iranian parliament.
Iran's ranking on various global index has been correctly described by the Human Rights Watch as the "Discrimination against women in the Iranian labor market is shaped in part by the political ideology that has dominated Iran since the Islamic revolution, which pushed women to adopt perceived “ideal roles” as mothers and wives and sought to marginalize them from public life."
