The Gujarat high court stated in its order that the scheme of employing AWWs and AWHs may be designed “to take advantage of the completely unequal bargaining power of an unemployed woman, more so when she is from a rural background.” HC cited the constitutional provisions prohibiting states from discriminating on the basis of sex and gender, and noted in its order that “all the employees working as AWWs and AWHs are women, and this might make the govt susceptible to allegations that since they are women, the State is discriminating against them by not absorbing them in govt service and, on the other hand, paying them meagre emoluments under the specious term ‘honorarium’.”
