Women in Labour is back focussing on post-pandemic economic distress

(From left) Aditi Mittal and Christina MacGillivray during a recording session from the previous season. Pic Courtesy/Instagram

The podcast Women in Labour started taking shape in 2019, after shocking statistics about the country's gender employment gap revealed that more and more Indian women were falling out of the workforce at an alarming rate. A pandemic has ravaged the world since then. And in the first episode of season two of the series, we discover that although women's workforce participation is at its highest now, they are coming back under economic distress, not necessarily out of empowerment. It's a reality that the guest speaker, journalist Namita Bhandare, along with hosts Christina MacGillivray and Aditi Mittal unravel, over the course of 33 minutes. But it's not all grim. MacGillivray and Mittal remind us that if women everywhere, at their individual level, can lift each other up, then that's something, isn't it?

This ray of actionable hope ties episodes of season two together. "‘Sweeping your own corner of the world' - this is a reflection of who Christina is as a person. It's one of the most powerful things that we can do, especially when the larger picture is so bleak. I can't monitor the entire classroom. But if I keep my corner and desk clean, and enough of us keep our desks clean, the classroom will change," Mittal shares.

The duo began working on the new edition in 2021. Over seven thousand miles apart - Mittal in Mumbai and MacGillivray in the US - they joined forces and readjusted their focus on how the pandemic has affected women, while zooming into issues like why economic independence is crucial for socio-political independence of women; how women are negotiating their work's worth at home and in the professional sphere; why women tend to be over-mentored and under-sponsored; why an equitable workspace is important for all; how women can network; and how they can help each other.

The guests in the first four episodes that are live include Bhandare, Varsha Adusumilli who runs Wonder Girls, Dr Ruha Shadab who founded Led By Foundation - India's first professional incubator for Muslim women, and Parmesh Shahani, an author, LGBTQiA+ inclusion advocate and founder of Godrej India Culture Lab. Through compelling data and their life experiences, the guests help us navigate issues that are often distressing. But it is the light-hearted humour, hope and a whole lot of empathy of the hosts that stay with us.

Log on to: womeninlabour.com