Women in Public Finance: Stories of gender in budgeting

Previous week, the famous publisher Routledge has come out with the articles by 22 women economists about their life stories. Chapter eight is about the life story of Indian economist Lekha S Chakraborty, Professor and Chair of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) in Delhi. The book is edited by Manal Fouad and Maja Bosnic.

“Born into a traditional Muslim family in India and abandoned by her father at the age of three, the author’s journey has been one of resilience, determination, and breaking barriers. Despite early hardships, she pursued higher education with unwavering commitment, ultimately joining the Ministry of Finance Research Institute in New Delhi. Here, she had the privilege of contributing to one of India’s pioneering initiatives in gender budgeting-a transformative project aimed at integrating gender perspectives into public financial management to promote equality and social justice, in a country where gender discrimination starts even before birth.

“My mum was abandoned by my dad when I was three years old, just as my younger brother was born. It was while she was in the advanced stage of this pregnancy that my father’s decision of ‘Talaq’ (divorce) was delivered to her by post in a simple inland letter. From that moment, the way she managed to raise her two children alone is a story of sadness and profound grit, only a few can realise,” starts the eighth chapter, titled ‘Gender Budgeting: That fire in my belly’, written by Lekha S Chakraborty.

When India’s Union Budget 2001-02 was unveiled, the UN commissioned me to analyse it through a gender lens — as a foundational study for advocacy.

During Parliament’s post-presentation recess, I crafted the “2001 Gender Budgeting Macro Scan Report”, disseminating it to Parliamentary Standing Committees to spark informed debates in “Vote on Account” sessions. I presented my study findings to the Rajya Sabha’s women Parliamentarians, chaired by the Deputy Speaker, igniting momentum for gender budgeting. Yet formal institutionalisation arrived only in 2004 via the Ministry of Finance.

“With multilateral organisations and UN entities, gender budgeting gained momentum. A pivotal turning point was the UN’s inaugural regional meeting on gender budgeting in Kathmandu, in 2001. There, the UN commissioned a South Asia-wide study, mirroring the methodology I had pioneered. I was tasked by the UN to do my first international assignment: moving to Colombo to lead it, collaborating with Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Finance, Finance Commission, Ministry of Women, and sectoral ministries. The framework, far from sector-agnostic, involved crafting analytical matrices and institutional mechanisms with budget officials.

Translated into vernacular languages, the research was disseminated provincially for subnational gender budgeting. In the 2002 Budget Speech, Sri Lanka announced its national and subnational rollout-predating India’s institutionalisation.

“In 2004, India institutionalised gender budgeting. India also rolled out the adoption of fiscal rules capping the fiscal deficit at 3 per cent of GDP annually. My expertise in macroeconomics and human development earned recognition; the Ministry of Finance invited me as a member of the 2003 “Classification of Budgetary Transactions Committee,” tasked with institutionalising a template grounded in gender budgeting. Our recommendations led to the Budget Speech announcing that India would launch gender budgeting from 2005-06, enforced rigorously via Budget Call Circulars.

“Concurrently, the Government of India summoned representatives from 29 states to Delhi for perspectives and training on state-level implementation. Retaining our methodology, I drafted the Methodology Manual and led the sessions. I was thrilled by the earnest deliberations across states-our framework, built from a clean slate, now cascading into tangible policy impacts. It marked a validation, and gender budgeting was hailed as fiscal innovation,” writes Lekha S. Chakraborty, dedicating the chapter to her mother, Salma.