My Master's Research Journey: Women's Land Ownership in India

During my fourth-year development class, I was tasked with writing a research paper on a development topic of my choosing. I was unsure where to begin, so I started researching different topics, and that’s when I came across women’s land rights. Women’s land rights is not a well-known development topic in the Global North and it was my hope that through my research I would be able to help bring awareness to women’s land rights.

Early in my masters program, I decided to focus my research on India as I knew I wanted to frame my research around the Indian development economist Bina Agarwal’s scholarship on women’s land rights in India and South Asia. Within India, thousands of women are being denied their right to own land despite the codified legal rights and policies put in place to mitigate this issue.

In 2005, the Indian government released a revised Hindu Succession Act as a means to addressing the persisting gender inequality issues that were present in previous Acts (Agarwal, 2005). The new Act address agricultural land, joint family property, and other important issues. However, within Gujarat, India, gender disparities within land ownership remain alarmingly high with only 10.3% of agricultural land being owned by women despite them making up approximately 80% of the agricultural sector. Research has shown numerous factors contribute to this significant gender disparity, including inadequate policies, lack of policy enforcement, patriarchal societies, and literacy barriers.

In an attempt to carry out my research I began investigating organizations in India that focus on women’s land rights, and I found The Working Group for Women and Land Ownership (WGWLO). WGWLO is a formal but unregistered network of organizations and individuals that has been active in Gujarat, India, since 2002. WGWLO addresses the issues of women’s land ownership, gender equality and livelihood. My research aims to gain an understanding of WGWLO's Legal Clinics, a capacity building tool and educational program, and how they have impacted women's land rights in Gujarat.

The Legal Clinics were created in 2019 and are one of WGWLO's strengths due to their capacity building components. The Legal Clinics not only work on building the capacity of their Paralegal Workers (PLWs) but also on building the capacity of female community members. Through the four years that the Legal Clinics have been active, WGWLO has organized 41 Legal Clinics and have helped approximately 90 women through the legal process of securing land rights.

Despite the accomplishments that are directly associated with the legal clinics, I was able to identify areas for improvement. The main limitation of WGWLO's Legal Clinics is their infrequency. The clinics are held every three to four months, creating a long period of stagnation where cases cannot proceed due to cases being too difficult for PLWs to handle (Makhija, 2020). Additionally, adult learners consciously choose to engage in their learning because they feel as though it is the right time in their life to do so (Danver, 2016). If a woman approaches a Legal Clinic ready to learn about her land rights but is then pushed off until the next Legal Clinic, the risk arises that in the three to four months that she was waiting, she lost interest in claiming her rights or no longer has the time to fight her rights. In order to accompany these cases, WGWLO needs to either bring in full-time lawyers or expand their training programs for PLWs.

Unfortunately, in April 2023, my plans to conduct my research and complete a thesis got flipped upside down. My connection at WGWLO was experiencing unforeseen family circumstances and was no longer able to actively pursue our partnership. It was at this point that my advisor and I decided it was best if I switched to a Masters Research Paper (MRP). This switch was not an easy decision for me, I had to adapt to the situation and WGWLO remained the focus of my MRP, as I aimed to understand how learning opportunities, specifically Legal Clinics, provided by WGWLO benefited their clients. Since I was no longer able to conduct my own research, I used secondary data that I received from my contact at WGWLO during one of our early communications.

Through my master’s research journey, I not only learned how to effectively create and foster partnerships, but I also learned the importance of patience and adaptability. Collaborating with an organization across the world in a rural community came with numerous barriers (i.e., time differences, unreliable internet access, and language barriers). I had to learn to be patient with the organization and understand that these barriers were not their fault. In the future, I would be excited for the opportunity to form new international partnerships and conduct international research. However, I would approach these opportunities with a more cautious mindset and remind myself that challenges may occur but that these challenges are a natural part of the research process.

Kate DeBaets is a MSc graduate in Capacity Development and Extension with a specialization in International Development. Her research focuses on women’s land rights in India and how learning opportunities, specifically the Legal Clinics, provided by the Working Group for Women and Land Ownership (WGWLO), a network of organizations within Gujarat, have benefitted their clients (i.e., local women, paralegals, and grassroot outreach workers). She is an advocate for lifelong education and women’s rights.