GENDER EQUALITY
NEED OF THE HOUR
IN OUR
COUNTRY
As we all know that
female population in the country is almost half the total population, and also
women in the family can influence the family to a greater extent, as such women
play a decisive role in the many issues, Contribute to the development of the family,
village, society, country. As women understand the issues better, especially
issues related to females, girls and children. It is very unfortunate to know
that in our country nearly 52 % women suffer from anemia, 45 % of the children
are malnutricined, over 35 % children’s BMI is below average and India 4th most
dangerous place to be born as women with over 100 million people being victims
of trafficking, mostly women and girl children, with high rate of female
feticide and high rate of infant mortality rate.
Why this is happening in
a country like India with rich culture and tradition to respect and worship
women like goddess, mother, and sister we need to introspect, should make
thorough analysis of various issues related to women and children.
As per the provisional census 2011
reports the
child sex ratio in India has dropped to 914 females against 1,000 males the
lowest since Independence -
Despite a slew of laws to prevent female feticide and schemes to encourage
families to have girl child, the ratio has declined from 927 females against
1,000 males in 2001 to 914, which was described as a "matter of grave
concern".
The infant mortality rate of
50 per 1000 live births (more in number of females than male) and child (0-4
years) mortality rate at 14.1 (more in rural areas 15.7 as compared to urban
areas 8.7 per 1000 births)
It is very unfortunate to mention that most of the state governments are running their welfare schemes and
other projects based on the revenue earnings of the liquor excise duty, it
is an open secret and the fact that BPL families and the down trodden families
are the majority victims of the cheap liquor and liquor in many ways (
especially women and children in the family), as large quantity consumers of
the cheap liquor / liquor and major contribution to the state excise is from
the BPL and down trodden families only. The state governments spending revenue
earning from the liquor for various welfare programmes, other development programmes
is nothing but swindling the hard earned money from the down trodden from one
hand and pretending giving it from the other hand to them, just for the purpose
of vote bank politics, in that implementation of welfare schemes also having
lot of pilferage.Liquor and cheap liquor consumption by the earning member of the family especially belong to BPL families plays a vitol role in the overall development of the children, women health in the family.
As per the statistics
over 52 % of the women in the country are anemic patents (the percentage in the
rural areas is much more than the national average and it is many folds in the
women belonging to SC, ST communities compared to other castes), and over 45 %
of the children in the country are malnutrition/ under nutritioned (malnutrition, Under nutrition includes both protein-energy malnutrition and micronutrient
deficiencies. Undernourishment not only affects physical appearance and energy
levels, but also directly affects many aspects of the children’s mental
functions, growth and development which have adverse effects on children’s
ability to learn and process information and grow into adults that are able to
be productive and contributing members of society. Undernourishment also
impairs immune function leaving them more susceptible to infection., Various
factors contribute towards a high malnutrition rate but poverty, ignorance,
faulty infant and child-feeding practices are the primary causes,) and
over 35 % of the children and youth in the country are having sub standard/
below average BMI (body mass index) which is less than 18.5, with more cases in the rural
areas mostly belonging to the BPL, Down
trodden families belonging to SC, ST, BC, Minority and Economically backward
people of other castes.
Also it is the fact that as a large number of population more than 100 million people (around 10%
of Indian population) in India are over-nourished, over nutrician is consuming
either too much calories or the wrong types of calories such as saturated fat,
trans-fat or highly refined sugar which leads to obesity and many other chronic diseases.
Children's
nutritional status is also expected to be influenced by mother’s educational
attainment. Children whose mothers are non-literate are about slightly more
likely to be severely underweight as compared to children whose mothers have
ten or more years of schooling. (Children of mothers with ten or more years of education are 27% underweight
while 45% of those with mothers who cannot read are underweight).
One of the most
important issue in the country facing by the girl children and women today is
the lack of adequate toilet facilities, especially for women at all places.
It is acute need to create toilets facility for all, with separate toilet facility for females, maintaining
all toilets hygienically, always keep
them in usable condition every time, 24/7 throughout the year at all places
starting from educational institutions like schools, colleges, universities,
in all offices, commercial establishments, public utility places including
religious establishments adequately, proportionately (based on the strength of
the students male and female, on the strength of the employees in the office,
number of footsteps in the commercial areas, religious establishments) and ensuring
to get maintained them in hygienic condition especially in the government run
educational institutions, more specifically at primary and secondary schools in
the country which are numbering over 7.67
lakh schools at the primary level and over 2.74 lakh schools at the upper
primary level spread in all states and union territories, with
90.2 per cent primary and 72.2
per cent upper primary schools managed either by Government or by local
bodies. It is a fact that majority of the
studies/reports indicate that majority of the school dropouts are girl children
only, more drop outs are from schools run by government, with an estimate of
around 76 lack girl children are out of school only due to lack of toilet
facilities, and also around 30 % of the children who are studying are leaving the
school after lunch hour leading to poor results in the education, mostly in
rural areas due to lack of toilets facility for the girl child or due to un
hygienic, un useable toilets conditions of the existing toilet facilities. This
situation is very acute in the co-education schools. Also the studied
indicate the girl child who are continuing their studies in spite of these
miserable condition of lack of toilets or un usable toilets are mostly are
under weight, to their age and having below average body mass index (BMI), because
of the reason that if they fear to take food sufficiently, as they take more
food need to drink more water, thus they cannot control the urination in the
school, to avoid this situation they are consuming less food. Also recent
studies indicate that due to the lack of toilets / un hygienic toilets in
various places from offices to public
places, especially in educational institutions the girl children, female
teachers and females in other places are controlling/holding the urinals for
long hours leading to many health complications/deceases in the females from urinary tract infection to cancers, to
diabetics to many other disorders/ deceases in the long run in the later stage
in the life effecting their heath causing a severe physical and mental stain to
the individual, the family and the society.
Also
it is important issue women facing in India is breast cancer, Indian women
are suffering with breast cancer are growing in number every day, over 60
thousand women dying due to breast cancer in India(Western lifestyle, increased consumption of fat products,
obesity, late marriages, delayed child bearing and less number of children
being conceived, , higher hormone levels, late age of menopause, smoking, alcohol and
economic status leading to reduced breastfeeding are all believed to be
behind this increased risk of breast cancer).with an estimate of 2 lack
cases per annum increase.
The very serious issue faced by women in the country is trafficking, as a high level of female
infanticide and sex trafficking make India the fourth most dangerous country
in which to be born a woman with an estimate of over 100 million
people in India are prone to trafficking, the human trafficking, which
involves 100 million Indians, mostly women and girls according to official numbers,
female feticide and female infanticide, which are both massive." The
Central Bureau of Investigation estimated that in 2009, about 80% of
trafficking took place within the country and that there were some 3 million
prostitutes, of which about 40% were children. A survey compiled by the
Thomson Reuters Foundation pointed the then Home Secretary GOI, Madhukar
Gupta's estimate in 2009 that 100 million people, mostly women and girls, were
involved in trafficking in India that year.(India is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of forced labour (“The forced labor of millions of its citizens
constitutes India’s largest trafficking problem,” “Men, women, and children in
debt bondage are forced to work in industries such as brick kilns, rice mills,
agriculture, and embroidery factories.”) and commercial sexual exploitation, Women and girls are trafficked within the country for the purposes of
commercial sexual exploitation and forced marriage especially in those areas
where the sex ratio is highly skewed in favor of men. Children are subjected to
forced labor as factory workers, domestic servants, beggars, and agriculture
workers, and have been used as armed combatants by some terrorists and insurgent groups. Indian women are
trafficked to the Middle-East for commercial sexual exploitation.
There are also victims of labor trafficking among the laks of Indians who
heavily migrate willingly every year to the Middle East and Europe for
work as domestic servants and low-skilled laborers. In some cases, such workers
are the victims of fraudulent recruitment practices that lead them directly
into situations of forced labor, including debt bondage; in other cases, high
debts incurred to pay recruitment fees leave them vulnerable to exploitation by
unscrupulous employers in the destination countries, where some are subjected
to conditions of involuntary servitude, including non-payment of wages,
restrictions on movement, unlawful withholding of passports, and physical or
sexual abuse, these are due to mainly corrupt officials indirectly encouraging
the by failing in implementing the existing laws to prevent this barbaric acts) In order to prevent
trafficking need educate the women from
being a target to the trafficking mafia, discourage them from going as labour
to other countries, educate them about the travel abroad, regulating the tour
operators, regulating the overseas recruitment agencies, obtaining the
passport, visa, work permit in consultation with the ministry of external
affairs and ministry of overseas affairs. Also need to destroy the red light
areas in all districts/areas in India with the help of police and society. An
estimate of around 3 lack girls are missing in our country and majority of them are pushed into flush trade,
an estimate of over 3.5 million females are in forced flush trade in India,
majority of them are from BPL families and belonging to backward districts and
majority of them belong to Scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and minorities, Nearly
50 per cent are from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and 12 to 27 per
cent from Other Backward Classes (DWCD 1998).Trafficking is become an organized
crime run by mafias, just the anti trafficking wing with name sake few
officials in every district is not at all sufficient, what is requires is a
strong force like anti terror force with stringent laws and punishments for the
traffickers as well as the government officials lenient or having hand in this
barbaric act due to corruption, is very necessary to save our children, girl
child and women from this barbaric and brutal acts. Many young girls belong to
the BPL families are lured with good jobs/livelihood in other states/ abroad or
people trapped in love with marriage promise, and sold it to the prostitution
rockets in other states/ countries. Those who are trapped are virtually living
dead and are being raped repeatedly every day several times (on an average of 6
times) (various reports indicate up to 18 forms of violence faced by women
trafficked for prostitution. They may be starved, locked up in a dark room,
beaten, burnt with cigarette butts, bound, forced to drink, strangled, stabbed
or killed for not trading their bodies. The women face threats of torture and
physical abuse, even their families are not spared, and they may be murdered if
they do not cooperate),
when the so called mahila netas, mahila organization make hue and cry for any
single rape incidence occurring in any metro city or state capital or any place
if the victim come daringly, openly and lodge complaint. Why cannot these
mahila leaders, mahila organizations fight for all the several lakhs of young
girls and young women who are being trapped in the trafficking and being raped
every day several times?
Also women are being
treated as commodities in all the advertisements just to attract the eye balls
, even in men’s related products and in some commercial goods advertisements
showing women Also the film are literally playing spoil sport role in
spoiling the youth of the country,
degrading the respect for the women, by exhibiting double meaning
and exhibiting women in very awkward and voluptuous positions in the name of called
item songs, and songs projecting women in semi nude out fits, sceneries in
vulgar gestures for attracting the audience naming this vulgar act of showing
the females as glamorous, by the producers and directors by justifying them
self’s that the situation in the story demands, how far a traditional society should
accept this vulgar acts of minute
section of elite, upper echelons of the society, so called celebrities,
creating a degraded and declined moral values in the society for their self
centered selfish acts and benefit out of this for their own luxuries at the
cost of traditions, values and morals, should be censored even though the actor/actress
may not exhibit any sign of objection
for showing herself in such gestures for the fear of losing the opportunities, for
the sake of monitory benefits, by attracting people to watch the films. (Because
of these, the curiosity among youth being on the rise, tempting them to
repeated the acts leading to watching of pornography, pre martial sex, drug
abuse, etc)
Advocating development
and westernization means not to portray the women in the semi nude and
voluptuous clothing naming it as fashion and glamour, should be condemned in
all forms. It is very necessary and ideal to promote the freedom for the
girl child and women to have the choice of food, choice of clothing, choice of
education, financial freedom, choice of everything in life that are acceptable
to majority of the society in the country as a whole (including the rural and
urban population) preserving, promoting our age old traditions and customs
which are up holding the respect for women.
Also the so called
fashions shows, glamour shows and that were being promoted by the upper
echelons of the society comprising of celebrities, socialites’ and leaders possessing
the characteristics of celebrities. (Less than 0.1% of the population of the
country) As these shows are creating a maniac in the country spoiling the youth
who are gen-next (over 70 % of the population of the country) making their
mindset filled with equating the entertainment means just film songs and live
shows of songs , fashion shows in all events of public gatherings as a result
there is certainly rape cases against
women are on raise party due to the provoking vulgar seans in the movies (mostly
the so called item numbers with dirty dances, partly to blame media / news
channels for promoting / exhibiting in
media as well, for increase in TRP/viewership ratings.. but strangely if the
same daces are performed by some section
of females in rural areas and small towns on stages for to earn lively hood for
their families due to poverty, bearing the shame, keeping their self respect
aside.. are being portrayed by the media and society as indecency and vulgar, offence, how can one
justice for poor and one justice for the elite ? is not truly double standards for promoting, accepting the form of live
shows at almost all the major functions and events? Of course whether it is
urban or rural these shows should be banned.
Also the small screen i.e
television serials portaging women as villains’ and venomous persons degrading
the respect for women in the society. As many of the researches clearly
indicate the addiction of women towards such venomous and envious serials creating
a psychological disorders in the women thus effecting the whole family at large,
for the benefit produces and few artists, lacks and corers of women and Indian
families are being affected.
In addition completely
banning the so called reality shows, especially banning the publicity of porn
stars by the reality shows as well as the publicity by the media causing
curiosity to the youth and children, who are later getting addicted to porn, in
order to save our culture and tradition and children and youth not becoming
perverted, ruining their lives as more than 20 % of the advanced mobile
phone users are watching pornography in the phones Pornography and terrorism related websites should be blocked in order to ensure that our youth will be grow
in a culture atmosphere, preserve the traditions and culture of our country,
contribute their talent and energies in a progressive development, (as surveys indicate
indicate almost 38 % of the children (47 % boys and 29 % girls) and youth are
watching pornography in the late night due to access of internet at home and also at cyber
cafes in day time (major revenue earning for majority of cyber cafes is
allowing its users to surf the prone by not blocking the porn sites), ruining their future and
life, by addicting to the porn , as a
result there is an increases in pre martial sex/ under age sex (as per the National Institute of Health and Family Welfare-A quarter to a third of India’s young people indulge in
premarital-sex. (17% among schoolchildren; 33% among young working class, 17.4
years is the average age for first sex for boys and 18.2 for girls in India.
With 60% of them had sex rarely or sometimes; 14% frequently with 3-4% had
multiple partners and 50% of females and 45% males never used a condom.) As such the girls are
becoming lesbians, raise in live in relationships (even tough supreme court did
not find fault for this act terming it as “right to live under article 21”
by stating that
a man and woman living together without marriage cannot be construed as an
offence.),
one of the reason for late marriages in urban areas and working class youth,
also due to perverted ness of the
partners who are addicted to the porn leading to increase in number of marriages
not being consumed, increase in domestic violence against traditional women, increase
in divorce cases etc) Also the blocking of pornography will certainly lead to
downward trend of the crime rate against children, especially girl child, females.
India with over 70 % of its population being youth it is very necessary to
prevent this porn, to save and preserve our tradition and culture.
India being the nation with the largest number of child
laborers in the world. In India majority of children
work in industries, such as cracker making, diamond polishing, glass,
brass-ware, carpet weaving, bangle making, lock making and mica cutting to name
a few. The child labors endure miserable and difficult lives. They earn
little and struggle to make enough to feed themselves and their families. They
do not go to school; more than half of them are unable to learn the barest
skills of literacy. Poverty is one of the main reasons behind this phenomenon.
The unrelenting poverty forces the parents to push their young children in all
forms of hazardous occupations. Child labor is a source of income for poor
families, a profit making human machines for the employers as they pay very
less for the child labour. They provide help in household enterprises or of
household chores in order to free adult household members for economic activity
elsewhere. In some cases, the study found that a child's income accounted
for between 34 and 37 percent of the total household income. In India the
emergence of child labor is also because of unsustainable systems of
landholding in agricultural areas and caste system in the rural areas. Bonded
labour refers to the phenomenon of children working in conditions of servitude
in order to pay their debts. The debt that binds them to their employer is
incurred not by the children themselves but by their parent. The creditors
cum employers offer these loans to destitute parents in an effort to secure the
labor of these children. The arrangements between the parents and contracting
agents are usually informal and unwritten. The number of years required
to pay off such a loan is indeterminate.
It is very true unless
the political power exists for women proportionate to their population (at
least 33% reservation for women) the issues related to women cannot be fixed /
resolved. Although women play important role in deciding whom to be in the
power to rule in the electoral politics, surprisingly there are very few women
representatives in the political system from assembly to parliament.
As of now only 11% women
members in Lok Saba (only 60 out of 543), and 10.7 % women members in Rajya Sabha (24 out of 240), India raking
105 in the world in terms of women’s representation in the legislative system,
even countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh
are way ahead in this regard with better ranking.
Also to mention here that
majority of the women representatives in India are either wife, daughter, and
daughter-in-law of some sitting or former male leaders only, as such such women
leaders do not have much voice except being titular heads being the proxies of
their male family members. It is very
evident from various reports that the entire management of the territory where
women representatives exist was done by
their men and hardly there is any real development for women in those
territories, their exist very few women
members who do belong to this category. So the mahila organizations should put
positive pressure on political parties so that more women will get opportunity
to get into politics and acquire political power.
In order to fix / resolve
the issues mentioned, gender quality is necessary in the all areas especially
in political system.
As women are better communicators and also only women can understand their
gender issues better and also common women can freely share their feelings and
issues with women in politics a better
way, with political power, will certainly able to create awareness, create
better facilities, educate all other the women for better heath care, for improvement
of living standards, bring pressure on governments for creation of laws which have
fixed time frame for delivering justice in women related crimes, eradication of
trafficking by making trafficking a double life imprisonment or capital
punishment with laws of traffic prevention more stringent than anti terror laws,
and partners & pimps in the prostitution should get life imprisonment, with
rape victim/ trafficking victim having the choice recommending for impose of
live imprisonment or capital punishment for the offender. Also most important
thing is to have financial freedom for women, better way is to start with
mandatory fifty percentage reservations for women in employment opportunities
both in government and private establishments at all levels (lower, middle and
higher). This should be implemented in phased manner (over a period of 10 years
as maximum limit to ensure the organizations having 50 % female members at all
levels.).There should a Gender Equality Tax with levy of over 20 % of the total salary bill of the
organization (organisations with two employees like a small shop to organisations with several lack employees like railways) for not maintaining the 50 % gender equality. This
amount should be utilized for the purpose of creation of better facilities for
women and child development. Also it should be mandatory that all firms, all companies, NGO's, all Trusts whether running on profit or non-profit should have mandatory 50 % of the members as women to get registration. It is also a fact that organizations/ enterprises
headed by and run by women are very successful, are functioning effectively and
efficiently compared to male leading the organizations. Also it should be
mandatory that all welfare scheme benefits to all sections of people extended
by central government or state government should be directly credited to the
bank accounts of the women in that family. Hope apart from the girl children,
women, all men who has respect for the mother, respect for sister, respect for
wife, respect for daughters will certainly appreciate and support this noble cause.
***
JAI HIND
