Around a third of urban Indians (29 per cent) feel safety for women should be the country's focus in 2020, a survey has revealed.
Less than half of this number feel the economic condition (12 per cent) and job market (11 per cent) should receive attention in the new year, according to the survey by the UK-headquartered online market research and data analytics firm YouGov.
Data for this survey was collected online by YouGov Omnibus among around 1,011 respondents in India between December 10-13, 2019 using YouGov's panel of over 8 million people worldwide.
Not only do people feel women safety needs prominence, close to half of the people (45 per cent) said it did not improve in 2019.
Although both men and women felt this equally (43 per cent men and 48 per cent women), there was a difference of opinion amongst the age groups, it said.
A higher number of Gen X (52 per cent) felt that measures for women safety did not show any advancement in 2019 as compared to the millennials (40 per cent), it added.
Moreover, many felt that economic conditions (39 per cent), political situations (35 per cent) and job scenario in the country (35 per cent) did not see any improvement in 2019.
However, over a third (35 per cent) said technological developments witnessed a positive shift in the past year.
Looking back at the past year, YouGov data showed that although happenings from the sports and entertainment world remained in the public eye throughout 2019, politics took precedence over them and the top three highlights of the year belonged to this area.
When asked what according to them was the most important political event of 2019, the revoking of Article 35A emerged on top (with 28 per cent saying it was the most important event).
Similarly, for the most important cultural and sports events, 'the Ambani wedding' and 'FRIENDS' 25th Anniversary' and 'India's performance in ICC World Cup 2019' came on top, respectively.
However, when asked to choose the highlight of 2019 from a combined list of 20 of these political, cultural and sports events, a quarter (24 per cent) chose the revoking of Article 35A as the spotlight event.
This was followed by the Ayodhya case hearing (18 per cent) and Bharatiya Janata Party's victory in the general elections (17 per cent), it added.
Looking ahead at 2020, one in five (19 per cent) Indians said the country's space project Chandrayaan 3 will be the biggest event of the new year.
Another 16 per cent think the T20 World cup will be a highlighting event, with a higher number of male than female respondents (20 per cent vs 11 per cent) saying this.
Some even thought the slow GDP growth (14 per cent), Nasa's Mars exploration program (12 per cent), India's smart city mission 2.0 (10 per cent) and the Delhi State Elections (9 per cent) will take centre stage in the new year.
A smaller proportion felt global events such as 2020 Tokyo Olympics (9 per cent) and the US Presidential Elections (8 per cent) will be the defining moments of 2020.
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content
