THERE is outrage — and there can never be enough outrage — at the statement of Bihar Education Minister Mithilesh Tiwari questioning the need for women to be out and about in public life and the value of educating them at all. He should have known better. Indeed, he is expected to know better.
A BA in economics from an evening college affiliated to Magadh University and often described as a coaching centre teacher in Patna, the minister is familiar with the value of education. He has been praised for pushing for education to be linked with employment. But there is concern that education is too often deeply linked to an ultra-traditional ideology. This fits right in with his recent statement.
But it is at odds with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s repeated framing of “women-led development" as a central, essential element for the success of ‘Viksit Bharat’. This will not happen if women are to be pushed back into cloistered homes, unable to choose their own pathways into the workforce.
Under the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government, one of the most hopeful signs of progress rested on his encouragement of girls’ education. Between the early 2000s and the mid-2010s, girls’ enrolment in secondary schools grew from about 55-60% to 75-80%. The famous bicycle initiative drew national attention. It did not matter whether it was successful in every village. It was a strong and visible indicator of movement — outward and upward — from the hold of orthodox traditions into the world of opportunity.
To reverse this would be a tragedy. Not just for equality, but also for the state’s well-being. Bihar’s unemployment rate stands at about 10-12%. Comparatively, women’s unemployment is roughly 20-25%, against the national average of 12-15%. Needless to say, where they are employed, it is at the lower echelons and at poorer salaries. Nevertheless, over the course of two decades, women’s employment under the governments of Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad Yadav grew by 4-6 percentage points. This was because of education.
Bihar’s 12.7 crore population (as per the 2023 Census population projections) presently contributes about 7-8% to India’s GDP. By comparison, Maharashtra, with a similar population, contributes roughly 15%. Women there make up about 20% of the workforce. Education that stands at around 12-14 years of average schooling for women has undoubtedly played a significant part.
On this analogy, energised by the inclusion of educated women into the workforce, Bihar’s GDP could probably double over the medium term if female education to employment pathways keeps expanding at rates seen earlier.
The world over, women’s inclusion has benefited economic growth. The massive numbers of women employed in the manufacturing and services sectors has been a key factor in China’s economic ascent.
Despite its social conservatism, investments in girls’ education, coupled with bringing women into the garment sector, has unlocked remarkable growth in Bangladesh. Today, its girls’ secondary school enrolment is so high that girls outnumber boys in classrooms and in the 2024 Global Gender Gap Report, it ranked 99th against India’s 129th.
Sri Lanka’s investment in women’s education has yielded some of the best human development indicators in South Asia. The evidence is incontrovertible. When women earn, families eat better, children stay in school longer and local economies grow.
Appreciation of traditional family values is all very well, but it cannot be based on women’s seclusion and subordination. Home is not always a safe haven for women.
Data from the National Crime Records Bureau report for 2024-25 makes this amply clear: in Bihar nearly half of all crimes against women — rape, cruelty, dowry-related abuse, and harassment — happen inside the home. In terms of pure numbers, this is higher than the national average and up from a decade ago. While it reflects a sad state of affairs at home, more reported crime also indicates that women are readier now to come out and seek remedy for their woes and that the state is readier to respond.
The significant backlash against the minister’s careless statement is also a hopeful sign. It signals that women are willing to talk back to those who would mock their expectations. Women are no longer passive reflections of menfolk but a decisive, independent political force with clear constituencies that voice demands, especially for their safety, education and jobs.
The new government must recognise that it is beholden to the large numbers of women voters who contributed materially to its win. The minister’s remark cannot be passed off as a slip of the tongue. It reflects a darker tryst with subservience and inequality. It demands an unambiguous withdrawal and a clear apology, backed by concrete reassurances about the new government’s commitment to girls’ education and women’s public life participation. The Education Ministry must align its language and policies with the aspirations of women — and, indeed, with the larger populace that wants Bihar to prosper.
Bihar needs an administration which understands that its future cannot be built on dragging half the population backwards into seclusion and submission; it must work actively to multiply every opportunity to further women’s presence in schools, workplaces and public life. This would be a good time to hold consultations and come up with a clear-eyed progressive operational blueprint to increase women’s participation at all levels of education. Only this can go some way to assuage the damage that has been done.
