| dc.description.abstract | Migration refers to the movement of people from one location to another,
either temporarily or permanently. People emigrating in search of jobs had an impact
on both the migrants’ and the state's socio-economic lives and consequently,
migration is a multifaceted process. The oil shock of the 1970s in the Gulf countries,
coupled with rising unemployment rates in Kerala, triggered substantial migration
from the state to the Gulf region. In the past, religious orthodoxy among the Muslim
community in Malabar, particularly in the Malappuram district, limited women's
access to education and employment opportunities, thereby restricting their freedom
and well-being. However, female perceptions have changed in response to changing
needs and situations, in which migration and remittances brought in by migrants
from abroad have a significant role. When the male migrates, the left-behind women
have to undertake increased responsibilities that were unfamiliar to them, which
influences the women's access and freedom of opportunity and improves their
control over household resources, mobility and decision-making power. The
utilisation of opportunities for left-behind women in the context of husbands’
migration is measured in terms of the Capability Approach.
The study is concentrated in the Malappuram district in Kerala, as the district
has the largest number of emigrants and the greatest proportion of foreign
remittances among the districts in Kerala, since the first Kerala Migration Survey
report of 1998. Multi-stage random sampling technique is applied to collect the
primary data and the sample size is fixed as 423 based on the Kerala Migration
Survey 2018.
In connection with evaluating the effect of male migration upon left-behind
Muslim women, the Women’s Capability Index was constructed by selecting the
relevant capability dimensions of women affected by the research environment. The
Ordinal Logistic Regression model is suitable for data analysis considering the
Women’s Capability Index as the ordinal and categorical dependent variable and the
duration of the migration and the remittances that the migrants send to the family as
the major independent variables. The study found that the migration duration is
statistically insignificant whereas the foreign remittances have a statisticallysignificant effect on the expansion of the capabilities of the left-behind Muslim
women in the study area.
To assess the factors contributing to the capability expansion of left-behind
Muslim women in the study area, the Exploratory Factor Analysis with Principal
Component Analysis was used. Eight factors with 36 sub-dimensions were
identified based on the reviews of the previous studies and survey experiences of the
pilot study. The result highlights that among the factors, migration and foreign
remittances, availability of social infrastructure of Banking and Transport facilities
exhibit higher factor loading (>0.08) indicating these factors are most influential
among the factors contributing to the capability expansion of left-behind Muslim
women in the study area. Moreover, the association of the factors with the women’s
capability indices shows that the factors are the major determinants of the capability
of left-behind Muslim women in the study area.
The study also assesses the role of capability expansion of left-behind
Muslim women in their socio-economic participation by applying the Structural
Equation Model. The parameter estimate shows that for every one unit increase in
the Women’s Capability Index, economic participation is expected to increase by
0.23 units and social participation is expected to increase by 0.31 units, holding
other factors constant. Hence it is concluded that the expansion of left-behind
women’s capabilities has a positive statistically significant moderate effect on their
socio-economic participation, demonstrating that when the left-behind women utilise
the opportunities created due to their husbands’ migration, their capabilities expand,
which will enhance their socio-economic participation.
Hence the study highlights that male migration and foreign remittances they
send to their households have positive effects on the capability expansion of left-
behind Muslim women in the Malappuram district. The recent scenario of left-
behind Muslim women in the Malappuram district enabled them to realise the
benefits of socio-economic and political participation owing to increased educational
opportunities and financial support from abroad. | en_US |
