Background: Evidence from earlier studies on COVID-19 suggests that the countries led by female leaders were more successful in handling the COVID-19. Indian being patrilocal society evidence that woman’s political autonomy in autonomy in the Gram Panchayat do miracle concerning development. With this backdrop, the present paper aimed to explore the role of women’s political participation and leadership on the efficiency in combatting COVID-19 for Indian states. Methods: This predominantly empirical paper was entirely based on secondary data compiled from different sources. The empirical analysis of the paper was facilitated by the utilization of the Technical Inefficiency Effects model within the framework of Stochastic Production Frontier. The reciprocal of the death rate of COVID-19 was considered as the output variable. The health personnel and health infrastructures indicators were considered as inputs. Conversely, non-health determinants, including, women’s political leadership indicators were recognized as inefficiency effects variables. Results: The empirical result evidenced that West Bengal, a female-headed state became the second most efficient in the list followed by Karnataka. The empirical results accredited us to conclude that the efficiency of the Indian states to combat COVID-19 was highly influenced by female political participation and leadership, digitalization, urbanization, and literacy rate. Conclusion: The study expostulated for the women’s political autonomy. The study also advocated for the improvement of heath and non-health infrastructure for long-term benefit.
Shrabanti Maity did M. Sc in economics with specialization on Statistics and Econometrics from the University of Calcutta and then she gained her PhD degree from The University of Burdwan. She completed her post-doctoral research from Ghent University, Belgium. Currently, she is working as an Associate Professor of Economics at Vidyasagar University, Midnapore. Earlier she was appointed as Assistant Professor of Economics in Assam University (A Central University), Silchar. During this academic journey, she has published more than fifty articles in different reputed national and international journals and edited books. She has supervised five PhD and three M.Phil dissertations. Presently four candidates are pursuing PhD under her supervision. A book entitled, A Study of Measurement of Efficiency, written by her is published by Verlag Dr. Muller (VDM). Her areas of research interest are- Applied Econometrics, Human Development, Gender Studies, and Socio-economic Facets.
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