Women in science break barriers, but sexist cliches linger

The journey of women working at Isro, and its success, is proof that India needs more women scientists

- Gita Aravamudan

During the Chandrayaan-3 moon landing, one of the most delightful sights, for me, was seeing many women at consoles in the control centre, focused and actively involved in one of Isro's most prestigious launches. After the Vikram lander's successful touchdown on the moon came another delightful sightso many women engineers, scientists and administrative staff laughing and cheering, rejoicing in the success of the mission on which they had worked tirelessly for so many years.

Decades ago, when the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) was still very young, there were hardly any women on the staff. The few who were there in the early 1970s were restricted to housekeeping or administration. Even those jobs were sometimes denied to them as any government job was in demand and men got priority over women. In fact, in the early 1970s, almost all the stenographers were men because the big bosses, who were all male, felt more comfortable having male personal assistants. Many of them resisted employing women using the now outdated arguments about women being "unreliable" as they got married and had caregiving responsibilities. The few women there did not have a proper washroom or a place to relax.