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| Women's day: a celebration and a battle to look ahead | | | SANDEEP BHAT
EARLY TIMES REPORT
Women’s day: a celebration and a battle to look ahead
SANDEEP BHAT
March 8 is here again. Time to celebrate International Women's day. This year, the world will celebrate 100 years of progress towards gender equality. What does it really mean? Is it a day when by some unspoken signal `women’ are given their rightful place in society?
International Women's Day, however, is both a day to celebrate and a day to draw attention to the challenges that remains before gender equality is truly realised.
But even as we celebrate all this, we must pause, reflect and ask. Why the number of women as compared to men continue to decline in India? Why despite changes in the rape laws, the convictions for rape are few and far in between while the incidence of violent crimes continues to grow? Why despite the fact that India has the largest number of professionally qualified women in the world do parents continue to sell their daughters into marriage by paying unaffordable amounts as dowry? Why despite mountains of words about women's right to participate as equals in politics, the Bill to reserve one-third of the seats in Parliament for women dies an unnatural death in successive Lok Sabhas, unable to be introduced, leave alone discussed or passed?
It is meaningless to fix one day of the year as Women's Day as women all over the world are in a continuous battle within the society. Each and everyday should be celebrated as woman's day.
Some women on top slots express their views on what Women's Day means to them:
Dr Indu Koul Khoda:
It is a day to look back on past struggles and accomplishments, and more importantly, to look ahead at the untapped potential and opportunities that await future generations of women. We should consider both the steps forward toward better lives for women that have been taken in recent times, as well as the progress still required.
In other words, we can say it is a mixed picture, there is some good and some bad... more girls are in school, more women are working, more women are today able to break barriers and are full of confidence. However, the bad thing is that the potential and opportunities become fewer down the economic ladder. More girls need to be encouraged to enroll themselves in schools. The condition of women has changed a lot and lots need to be done.
Dr NAHEED SOZ, Managing Director, Jammu and Kashmir Women’s Development Corporation:
Women comprises of more than half the world’s population. And Women’s Day is many things – a cause for celebration, a reason to pause and re-evaluate, a remembrance, an inspiration, a time to honour loved and admired ones.
Unfortunately, despite their role and their know how, women’s contribution is often undervalued and ignored. Both in rural as well as urban areas, women are not treated at par with men. Though she plays a multidimensional role, as mother, as daughter, a wife, but instead of getting a word of appreciation, her worth is often underestimated.
Despite a more than decade long campaign to get more women's representation in India's legislative bodies, including Parliament, women are still missing from politics as patriarchal attitudes create doubts in their own minds as well as in society over their capability to be good leaders. Here in Jammu and Kashmir, only one woman has managed to get a berth in cabinet.
Meanwhile, on this day, I am organizing a programme where I will distribute Rs 30 lakh among women entrepreneurs. This is the best tribute to women.
Lastly a message: While celebrating Women’s Day, we should bear in mind that the struggle is far from over. Women’s empowerment should never be reduced to individual success stories. It should be about collective well-being.
INDU PAWAR, MLA
It is a matter of pride that, despite strong gender biases existing in certain regions, half the world’s population are women and at least one third of the world’s official labour force is female, doing two thirds of the world’s work. For many of us women life may be hard, difficult and certainly not equal – the inequity being fuelled by ethnic, cultural, economic, political and religious stigmas. There are horrendous realities which many women have to cope with, and which cannot be ignored, even as we revel together in the celebration of womanhood.
The condition of women has changed a lot, the government has framed several laws and we are working towards giving them a level playing field, but the problem lies in social mindset. On this special day, I wish there was some way in which we could check dowry deaths; or how many men abuse wives; or how many more girls were encouraged to get an education. The list is legion.
Even in this day and age, women face discrimination and prejudice. Yet, women all over the world continue to work hard to make a difference -– to alter their lives and the lives of others.
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