“It is well said that behind every successful women there is a tribe of other successful women, who have her back”. Everywhere we hear the slogan of women empowerment the basic question that arises in our mind is “are women become really strong” and “is long term struggle has ended”. Many program have been executed and run by the government such as International Women’s day, mother’s day in order to bring awareness in the society about the rights and value of the women in the development of the country. Women need to be move forward in the number of spheres. There is a high level of gender inequality in India where women are still ill-treated by their family members and outsiders.
The percentage population of illiterate people in India is mostly covered by the women. The true meaning of the women empowerment is to make every girl well educated and leave them free so that they can be capable to take their own decisions in any field.
Women in India are always subjected to the honor killings and they have never given their basic rights for the proper education and freedom. They are the real victims who have faced violence and abuse in the male dominated country. According to the National Mission for the Empowerment of women (NMEW) launched by the Indian Government, this step has shown some improvement in the 2011 census. The ratio of the female sex and female literacy both has improved. According to the Global Gender Gap Index, India needs to take some advance steps to improve the women position in the society through the proper health, higher education and economic participation. Women empowerment needs to take a rush in a right direction instead of being in nascent stage.
Importance Of Women Empowerment in India
India is a male dominated country where males are dominated in every sector and females are supposed to be responsible for family care and live in the home including other many restrictions. More than fifty of the population in India is covered by the female only so the complete development of the country depends on the half population which means women, who are not empowered and still restricted in many areas. In such condition, we cannot expect that our country would be a developed in the near future. The only way through which our country get developed, is through empowering women by the efforts of men, government, laws and women too.
Male dominated in the Indian society since ancient time so the need of women empowerment arose. From ancient times women are being suppressed by the society and their family members for many reasons. They have been targeted of violence and discriminatory practices by the male members in the family, society. India is a famous country proving proverb like ‘unity is diversity’, where people of varied religious beliefs are in the Indian society. Women are given a
special place in varied religion which is working as a big curtain covering the eyes of people. Previously in our Indian society, there was a custom of sati pratha, dowry system, sexual violence, female infanticide, wife burning, child marriage and child labour including other discriminatory practices. All such type of bad practices is because of male superiority complex and patriarchal system of the society.
Socio-political rights (right to work, education, decides for themselves) for the women were fully restricted by the male members of family. Many ill practices against women have been abolished by the open minded and great Indian people who raise their voices for the discriminatory practices against women. Through the continuous efforts of the Raja Ram Mohan Roy, British people were forced to abolish the ill practice of Sati paratha. Later, other famous social reformers of the India like Swami Vivekananda also had raised his voices and worked hard for the betterment of women in Indian society.
In the recent years, different constitutional and legal rights have been put into practice by the government of India in order to put an end to ill practices and gender discrimination against women. However, in order to solve such a big problem, the continuous effort of everyone including women is required. Present day society is being more aware about the women rights which results in the increasing number of several self-help groups, NGOs are working in this direction. Women are breaking the social barriers and are being more open minded in order to achieve their rights in all dimensions even after crimes are going side by side.
Government has passed another act Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Bill, 2015, for safety of women and to reduce crime against women in India. This act is the substitution of earlier Indian juvenile delinquency law of 2000 (Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000) in order to reduce the juvenile age in cases of heinous offenses.
Conclusion
In order to bring women empowerment and respect of women in the Indian society, people need to understand the main cause and eliminate the ill practices against women which are patriarchal and male dominated system of the society. People needs to be open-minded and should change their old mind set against women together with the constitutional and other legal provisions.
