Of the 57 companies which do not have a woman director, 26 are public sector undertakings (PSUs).
2,687 women hold 3,479 (21%) of the directorship positions, up from 17% as on March 31, 2020 and just 5% as on March 31, 2014 when the requirement to appoint one woman director on board had just been announced.
According to Pranav Haldea, managing director, PRIME Database Group, this is testimony to the huge role played by the regulation in improving the representation of women on board. However, after the regulatory requirement was mostly met, the pace of increase of women representation has slowed down considerably, which shows that companies are not actively pushing for gender diversity.
However, significant strides have been made with the number of companies having two more women on their board going up from 29% as on March 31, 2020 to 48% currently. Around 86% of companies – 1,837 — now have an independent woman director. Companies having two or more women independent directors have also increased from 8% as on March 31, 2020 to 22% currently.
Women hold just 480 out of the 4,828 (10%) executive directorship positions, up marginally from 8% as on March 31, 2020. Just 5% – 103 out of the 2,133 companies, have a woman MD/CEO- with barely any improvement over the last 5 years.
Only 123 out of the 2,133 companies, have a woman chairing the board, of which 46% are from the promoter group.
Women chairing committees has seen a significant improvement with 15% of companies having a woman chairing the Audit Committee (AC), up from 9% as on March 31, 2020, 13% to 24% for Nomination & Remuneration Committee (NRC), 15% to 23% for Stakeholders Relationship Committee (SRC) and 5% to 11% for Risk Management Committee (RMC).
Of the Independent Directorship positions held by women, 55% of such positions are held by women aged 60 or below in comparison to just 29% for men. According to Haldea, this indicates that women are taking up these roles as their second innings mid-life and not post-retirement like their male counterparts.
As on March 31, 2024, the highest share of women directors was in healthcare (23%) and lowest in energy (16%).