Muslim women get half the job call-backs Hindus do, amid hiring bias: Study

Even in terms of mode of contact, recruiters reached out to a Hindu woman more personally than to a Muslim, shows research

Highlighting the hiring bias against Muslim Women, a research conducted by LedBy Foundation has shown that for every two positive responses that the Hindu woman receive, the Muslim receive only one.

Measured in terms of net discrimination rate (NDR), Indian Muslim women scored 47.1 per cent compared to Hindu women, showcasing the discrepancy between job call-backs for Muslim and Hindu women.

An organisation focused on the economic empowerment of Indian Muslim women, the research was funded by LedBy Foundation and Maulana Azad National Urdu University in collaboration with Centre for Development of Policy and Practice (CDPP).

As part of the methodology, The research took an experimental approach and collected primary data through correspondence or resume study. Two equally qualified profiles were created to match the market standard for entry-level roles in India, with the only variable being the names; Habiba Ali for the Muslim profile and Priyanka Sharma for the Hindu.

The profiles were created without incorporating photographs and over 10 months, 2,000 job applications were sent through 1,000 job postings on job search sites like LinkedIn and Naukri.com.

Of the 1,000 jobs applied, while Priyanka received 208 positive responses, Habiba received 103 positive responses. Despite similar capabilities, Habiba’s profile was less favoured in about 50 per cent of the instances, the research found. Priyanka and Habiba both received 88 positive responses from the same organisations, but Priyanka received 120 responses from unique organisations while Habiba received only 15.

Even in terms of mode of contact, the recruiters reached out to the Hindu woman more personally than they did to the Muslim woman. While the Hindu profile under Priyanka Sharma garnered 41.3 per cent call-back, Habiba Ali received only 15.5 per cent.

"Recruiters reached out to Priyanka more proactively on her online profile. Habiba received only one positive response from recruiters coming upon her online job profile, whereas Priyanka received 15 such responses. This displays the difference in proactivity that recruiters have when they approach the two profiles and in turn, the more nuances within the biases that exist against Muslim women," the research stated.

The hiring bias continued in terms of industries as well as geographical regions with the response rate on Priyanka's profile being 16 per cent (South India), 14 per cent (West India) and 23 per cent (North India) compared to Habiba's six per cent, six per cent and 14 per cent, respectively.

As part of the research, LedBy Foundation recommended steps like 'Blind' and skill-based hiring process to be adopted wherein all non-essential candidate information such as name, schools, and ages are avoided to prevent unconscious bias while standardising recruitment processes by inducing a work sample test that mimics the Business-as-Usual for a role can enable prevention of any hiring bias.