New patterns of female migration in South Asia

Abstract

South Asian countries show different patterns of internal migration according to gender. In India, females have long dominated internal migration flows; censuses between 1971 and 2011 show that around 70 per cent of lifetime migrants were women. By contrast, in Bangladesh, in the last three decades of the twentieth century, more males than females moved (Afsar, 2000). A detailed study on one rural sub-district with excellent longitudinal data also shows more males than females moving out (Alam & Khuda, 2011). But in both countries, the patterns of migration have long been highly gendered: movement from rural areas to the cities (especially inter-state movement in the case of India) has been male-predominant, whereas localised patterns of movement have been femaledominated. Why this female predominance in localised migration? It results from marriage customs in the sub-continent, characterised (especially in north India) by village exogamy and women moving to their husband’s village on marriage. These villages were normally not very far from the woman’s home area, but sometimes further afield. Thus marriage (near-universal in South Asia) requires migration by most females after they reach marriageable age. While there is some short distance male migration as well, some of it seasonal, mainly for the purpose of seeking work, this is greatly exceeded by the marriage migration of females (Skeldon, 1985, p. 45). Because of the rules adopted in censuses for the recording of migration, in many countries much of the localised movement is not captured. It all depends on what boundaries have to be crossed in order to be considered as a migrant. If a district boundary has to be crossed, then moves within a district will obviously not be recorded. In the Indian census, the lowest units for determining migratory movements are the villages and towns whose boundaries are administratively defined. Any change of residence beyond the village or town/city boundary qualifies the person to be classified as a migrant. Given the pattern of village exogamy, most women’s moves to their husband’s place of residence on marriage are captured in the migration data. This is not the case in Bangladesh, however, where a district border must be crossed in order to be recorded as a migrant. (There are 64 districts in Bangladesh, with average populations of about two and a half million). Village exogamy is commonly though not universally practiced in Bangladesh, and most moves following marriage are less than 20 km (Rahaman, Akter, & Rahaman, 2010, Figure 2); many of these would be within the same district. The Bangladesh census would therefore not capture all marriage moves. The gender differences in migration patterns in India are striking. According to the 2001 Census, whereas 70 per cent of recent female migrants moved to rural areas, 51