Empowerment of Women is about helping them to stand on their own feet, help them take decisions in their life without any restriction of relatives or the society. This topic of women empowerment has been one of the most blazing and generally discussed issues worldwide including our own country for many years.
The issue of gender biasness and gender discrimination has been given the utmost priority even by the United Nations. In India, women are treated badly in every field be it political, social, education, sports and technology and innovation. Thus, it is essential that they are empowered to be independent and stand on their own legs.
They should be empowered in various forms and kinds in order to protect themselves and to secure their respect and dignity.
Woman Empowerment Importance
To have the bright future in family, society and country empowerment of women is essential. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru had said that to awaken the people, we should first awaken the women, because once a women has been awakened then the whole nation and family gets awakened with her.
In India, women have been always made a subject of honour killings and they have never been given their basic rights for proper education and freedom. They are victims who have to face day to day violence, abuse and other several ill treatments in this male dominated society and this patriarch society. Thus, in order to empower women in our country we need to get rid of all demons in our society who are suppressing women and killing them. In India, there is a high level of gender inequality where women are maltreated by their family members as well as outsiders. According to census most of the illiterate part of our society is women.
The real meaning of women empowerment is to make them well educated and leave them free so that they are capable to take their own decisions in any field.In all, we are in dire need to empower women so that they can be independent and not rely on men of our country to support them and take care of them. The women of our country should be strong broad minded and mature in taking their own decisions.Decision making in national topics or any other topics of our society should also encourage participation of women.
Equality Schemes
The principle of gender discrimination and equality is already engraved in the Indian Constitution in its Preamble, Fundamental Rights, Fundamental Duties and Directive Principles. The National Commission for Women was set up by an Act of Parliament in 1990 to safeguard the rights and legal entitlements of women.
For the benefit of women, the government of India has adopted and ratified various/different schemes and programs and international conventions and human rights instruments to secure equal rights for them, such as the National Credit Fund for Women (1993), Food and Nutrition Board (FNB), Information and Mass Education (IMF), Convention on All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), 1993, the Mexico Plan of Action (1975), the Nairobi Forward Looking Strategies (!985), the Beijing Declaration as well as the platform for Action (1995), Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD+5) and other such instruments. The New Panchayati Raj system is also one of the many other efforts on the part of Government of India to empower women at least at the village level.
Important role of Education
Hence, it can be concluded that status of women could be improved by women themselves and nobody else. In this age of science and technology, why the women should be left behind in comparison to men. The popular UNESCO slogan educate a man and you educate an individual; educate a woman and you educate a family is the most appropriate in today’s scenario.
Women will have to empower themselves from below in order to compel the government to empower them from above. There is also a need for a change of values and behaviour in the society. Education can play a most important and vital role in bringing about the required behavioural changes among women and make them well updated and equipped in terms of knowledge, competence and capacity to deal with different problems.