Government has constituted a Standing Committee to oversee the timely implementation of the recommendations of the task force for women in science. Announcing this at a press conference in New Delhi, Minister of Science and Technology and Earth Sciences, Shri Prithviraj Chavan said that the Committee under his chairmanship has 18 members. He said that the task force has submitted his report which is being studied and all feasible actions will be completed in a time bound manner. The Minister also said that a sub-committee will be constituted for development of women friendly policies and practical support systems inclusive of crèche, campus housing, transport, facilities for the elderly, mentoring, etc. Earlier, Shri Chavan interacted with several women scientists at the Women Scientists Meet 2009 organized by CSIR in coordination with DST and DBT. Some of the other outcome of the interactions are:

• Efficiency of existing gender sensitive scheme will be studied and actions taken to enhance their efficiency through revision of parameters and strengthening of implementation systems.
• A Nationwide survey of the reason for the pipeline leakage will be commissioned.
• Attempts will be made to make gender audit in scientific establishments obligatory: webpage information should carry statement of graduated goals and set up monitoring goals.
• Addressing the problems rather than achieving numerical goals will be the priority.
• Special schemes will be developed to avoid under employment of women.

Prof. S.K. Brahmachari, DG, CSIR, Dr. T. Ramasami, Secretary, DST and Dr. M.K. Bhan, Secretary, DBT were also present on the occasion.

Source : Press Information Bureau
Date : July 01, 2009