Kolkata: An Indian startup is countering the gender pay gap in its own way.In a first, Google-funded online-to-offline fashion e-commerce platform Fynd has not just levelled the salaries for men and women employees, it is paying women 10% more than their male counterparts.The idea was born when the 130-employee startup saw that while it had an overall 40% representation of women, it was only 4-6% in the engineering team, Fynd co-founder Harsh Shah said. An analysis showed that the talent pipeline itself was skewed towards more male engineers applying. “We thought of coming up with an affirmative action policy where we pay women more.That, we felt, would not only boost the pipeline by making the position more attractive to apply for, but set a benchmark for other companies,” said Shah.The startup plans to conduct a recruitment drive for women engineers in Mumbai Pune and Bengaluru in May. The pay hike was discussed with and supported by all the male employees, he claimed.The gender pay gap in India is still high, with a recent Monster Salary Index revealing that women earn 19% less than men.“Organisations wanting to achieve pay parity must begin with gaining an accurate understanding of their pay practices and how job roles compare. It is also crucial to review and overcome systematic barriers that may contribute to pay gaps,” Abdul Jaleel, vice president, employee experience, Adobe India, told ET. Adobe achieved global gender pay parity in 2018.According to diversity and inclusion expert Saundarya Rajesh, founder-president of AVTAR Group, the initiative makes a strong statement. But without bringing meritocracy into the equation, if an organisation says that it will pay extra because of a candidate’s XX chromosomes, it doesn’t send out the right message for women to be respected in the workplace, hired in more numbers and be perceived as a strong, sustainable talent pool,” said Rajesh.However, Fynd’s Shah said it will continue this approach as it scales up. “It’s a stand we have taken to counter bias,” he said.