A Naukri survey found 45% of respondents believe India has over 20% gender pay gap.
51% cited maternity breaks as the biggest reason; 27% pointed to workplace bias.
Both men and women shared this view, especially in IT (56%), pharma (55%), and auto (53%).
Pay gap impact most visible among professionals with 5–15 years’ experience, when maternity breaks are common.
Almost every one in two respondents (45%) in a survey said they believe that there is over 20% gender pay gap in the country mainly due to career breaks after children and workplace bias, a report said on Thursday.
More than half of the professionals (51%) identified maternity breaks as the single biggest reason behind the gender pay gap in India, while 27% pointed to workplace bias, the way women are perceived at work, as the primary cause.
1 December 2025
Get the latest issue of Outlook Business
Importantly, the report found that both men and women share this view and this belief was strongest in IT (56%), pharma (55%), and automobile (53%).
The impact of career breaks is especially evident among professionals in the 5-10 years (54%) and 10-15 years (53%) experience brackets, life stages when maternity breaks are most common, added the report.
This Naukri report is based on a survey among over 20,000 professionals across 80 industries and eight cities.
Further among the sectors, half of all professionals surveyed (50%) flagged IT as the industry with the widest gender pay gap, far outpacing real estate (21%), FMCG (18%), and banking (12%), said the report.
Geographically, India's technology hubs, Hyderabad (59%) and Bengaluru (58%), reported the highest concerns about IT pay inequities, it said.
Sectors like aviation (57%), education (52%), and IT (50%) reflected sharper perceptions of inequality, traditional industries such as oil & gas and retail offered a more positive outlook.
In oil & gas, more than 1 in 4 respondents said the gap was negligible (0-5%), the report added.
