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Women in India form a significant percentage of the overall workforce in unorganized sectors like agriculture and construction but their participation in organized sectors is limited. For example, women representation in India’s Public-Sector Undertakings (PSU), which constitutes a large employment base in the country spread across key organized sectors, constituted only 4.5% of the total Work Force (2011). Similarly, women employees in Central Public-Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) in India stood at 9.36 per cent in 2015-16, according to data released by the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE). The male dominance in the workforce of CPSE is often attributed to the nature of operations i.e. infrastructure and heavy engineering sectors. Such low gender representation in this large employment segment of the economy requires remediation as none of these segments is outside the reach of women.

USAID’s Greening the Grid (GTG), a five-year program under United States and India’s Partnership to Advance Clean Energy-Deployment (PACE-D), aims to support the Government of India’s (GOI) efforts to manage large-scale RE integration into the Indian power system. As a part of its commitment to promote gender equality and equity in all its programs, USAID through the GTG-RISE initiative (the central component of GTG) will work to improve gender inclusiveness in India’s energy utilities sector.

To maximize women’s participation and to strengthen gender diversity and equity in the power sector, a forum or platform will be created, called Women in Energy (WIE), for women representatives from the sector to engage with each other across a range of possible issues. The WIE will also identify women leaders in power sector and highlight their contributions so as to motivate aspiring qualified women to opt for careers in Indian power utilities.

Women Leaders in Energy