There are two things worth cheering about in the latest report of the National Statistics Office on India’s million-plus cities. First, female labour force participation has climbed from 19.8 per cent in 2017-18 to 27.2 per cent in 2025, showing the sharpest gain of any group. The second is entrepreneurship — in 32 of the 46 million-plus cities, more than 20 per cent of unincorporated establishments are now run by women. Cities have become India’s biggest centres of opportunity for women — and increasingly, it isn’t only the big metros. In Surat, Vadodara and Pune, 40 per cent of unincorporated establishments are run by women.

Both numbers deserve celebration, but they come with a catch. Female LFPR, even after this gain, is still barely a third of the male rate of 75.9 per cent. Startlingly, despite the shift in aspirations, nearly 70 per cent of women outside the labour force still cite childcare and home commitments as the reason, proof that this is far from a solved problem.

For the rest, however, four gaps explain why the LFPR gap is not closing faster. Every system that touches a woman’s working life — how she gets to work, whether she can occupy public space with the same ease as men, whether she rises once she’s in an organisation, whether a bank or an investor........

© Indian Express