THE PERFORMANCE OF GENDER BUDGETING IN KARNATAKA

Abstract

Gender Budgeting refers to a process of looking at the budget formulation methods,budgetary policies,and budget outlay from gender perception. It is a tool for achieving gender mainstreaming. It helps in assessing the gendered impacts of budget.Gender Budgeting looks at the government budgets from a gender perspective to assess how it addresses the needs of women in all sectors.It does not seek to create a separate budget.But it provides affirmative action to address the specific needs of women.Karnataka is a leading state in the introduction of gender budgeting at the state level and since 2006-07 Karnataka government has been preparing gender budget which is presented in the budget session every year.The present study makes an attempt to analyze the performance of gender budget in Karnataka. The analysis throws light on Classification of Schemes in Gender Budget Document, Contribution of Various Departments to Gender Budget,Trends in Number of Schemes reported in Gender Budget,Trends in Allocation under Gender Budget and Department Wise Allocation under Gender Budget in Karnataka. The analysis of gender budgets shows that the share of allocations for 100 percent women oriented programmes has shown a decline in recent years.