Ensuring gender parity has become a great challenge for the modern world. Gender equality forms part of development strategy in many countries of the world including India. When both men and women have equal access to services and resources, enjoy equal rights, and get equal opportunities to develop skills and capabilities then the development of the country is fast and balanced.

Despite considerable efforts towards advocacy and awareness of gender equality and launching of various programmes for welfare of women, gender discrimination in India remains pervasive in many dimensions of life. Though the nature and magnitude of discrimination against women vary from country to country, in no part of the world gender parity has been achieved completely in legal, social and economic terms. Gender gaps are widespread in respect of access to and control of resources, economic opportunities, and political voice. Women are still exploited, discriminated against and subjected to harassment and violence. In this perspective, the present volume covering various dimensions and strategies of gender development is highly topical.

     The volume has emerged from the research papers contributed by social scientists and academicians from different parts of India, focusing on specific gender-related issues. Both primary and secondary data have been used by the authors to analyse the problems and conclude with suggestions. The main themes which the volume covers are: agriculture and gender development, micro credit financing and women empowerment, role of Self-help Groups (SHGs) and NGOs in socio-economic development of women and health and education of women.

The volume will provide valuable information and inputs to academicians, researchers, NGOs, and government agencies and functionaries.

Himanshu Sekhar Rout was awarded Ph.D. in applied economics, M.Phil. (A and A Economics), M.A. (A and A Economics), M.A. (Public Administration) and M.Ed. from Utkal University, Bhubaneswar and APA from NIIT, Tezpur, Assam. He has attended 13 training programmes/short-term courses/summer schools/winter schools at various institutions like IIT Delhi, Karolinska Institute Stockholm, IIT Kharagpur, IIT Kanpur, ISI Kolkata, IGIDR Mumbai, IIM Kolkata, VVGNLI Noida, CSER Mumbai, CSS Surat and NIPFP New Delhi. He has 12 years of teaching/research experience in various organisations like Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar, Institute of Business Administration and Management, Bhubaneswar, Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussorie, Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan and Department of Economics, Utkal University, Bhubaneswar. He is presently involved in both teaching and research at P.G. Department of Economics, Dr. SRK Government Arts College, (Government of Puducherry), Yanam, India. His areas of teaching and research interest include economics of health and education, environmental economics, gender studies, IPR (GI) and tourism economics. He is a life member of Indian Economic Association, Indian Labour Economics Association, Indian Association for Research in National Income and Wealth and Orissa Commerce Association.

 Prasant Kumar Panda is presently working in the Post-graduate Department of Economics, Dr. SRK Government Arts College, Yanam, Government of Puducherry. Earlier he had worked in Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, Bhubaneswar and Silicon Institute of Technology, Bhubaneswar. His research interest includes public finance and public policy, health economics and gender studies and rural development. Besides teaching, he has been constantly contributing research papers to national and international Journals.