Despite rapid economic growth and increased participation in politics, Indian women are still facing some of the world's worst gender unequal conditions this year, according to an annual global study released Tuesday.

India slipped 13 spots in this year's World Economic Forum (WEF) Gender Gap Index, ranking 114^th of the 142 countries measured based on gender disparities in politics, economics, education and health. Last year, India ranked 101^st of the 136 nations surveyed.

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This puts India behind rising economic giants including China and Brazil, which ranked 87^th and 71^st respectively.

The drop is attributed to India's significantly lower score in literacy, infant survival, labor participation and estimated income. However, the Asian giant made it to the top 20 countries that have exhibited high gender equality in political participation and empowerment, registering an impressive 15^th globally.

The country fared worse in terms of economic participation (134^th), and educational attainment (126^th).

According to the WEF report, India is among the countries where there is an increasingly greater gender gap in terms of labor force. The Business Standard speculates that this results from the enrolment of a greater number of women and girls in educational institutions.

The country also received the second to the lowest ranking based on health and survival, just a spot ahead of the last placer, Armenia.

As in the two previous years, the world's most gender equal societies are from northern Europe.

Iceland heads the Nordic countries that made it to the top spots together with Finland, Norway, Sweden and Denmark.

Rounding up the top ten countries that promote equality between sexes are Nicaragua (6^th), Rwanda (7^th), Ireland (8^th), Philippines (9^th) and Belgium (10^th) with Yemen, Pakistan and Chad at the bottom of the index.

The Geneva-based study also revealed that the overall workplace gender gap would not close until 2095. Presently, the worldwide gap between the sexes in economic participation and opportunity pegs at 60 percent, which is a 4-percentage point improvement since the survey began in 2006.

TagsGender, Social Issues, World Economic Forum