Dr. Reenu Yadav
(Dean, IES University, Bhopal, Mrs. India International-2019, Social Activist)
Dr. Reenu Yadav, Dean, Principal (IITM, Department of Pharmacy) & Professor, Mother, Researcher, Social worker, or a beauty queen, what defines her best? She is blessed with the right blend of beauty, glamour, style, talent & intellect, coming to inspire people around her. She believes being optimistic and humble is the mantra of her success & life. According to her – “Being a crown winner or a beauty queen brings about a role of service & a sense of responsibility in her” and inspiration. She is a role model for today’s women. Dr. Yadav with her attractive qualities & magnifying persona impresses others and serves as a role model above all she proves “Women are the largest pool of talent in this Word”.
Women empowerment has become the buzzword today with women working alongside men in all spheres. They profess an independent outlook, whether they are living inside their home or working outside. They are increasingly gaining control over their lives and taking their own decisions about their education, career, profession and lifestyle. While it is true that women, by and large, do not face discrimination in society today, unfortunately, many of them face exploitation and harassment which can be of diverse types: emotional, physical, mental and sexual. They are often subjected to rape, abuse and other forms of physical and intellectual violence.
Women empowerment, in the truest sense, will be achieved only when there is an attitudinal change in society concerning womenfolk, treating them with proper respect, dignity, fairness and equality. The rural areas of the country are, by and large, steeped in a feudal and medieval outlook, refusing to grant women equal say in the matters of their education, marriage, dress code, profession and social interactions.
Women Empowerment: Making the World a Better Place We are living in an age of women empowerment. Women over the world are working shoulder-to-shoulder with men. By and large, they are now empowered to make decisions about different aspects of their life and profession. Women empowerment adds to the confidence of women in their ability to lead meaningful and purposeful lives. It removes their dependence on others and makes them individuals in their own right.
The necessity of Women’s Empowerment
Without women’s empowerment, we cannot remove injustice and gender bias and inequalities. If women are not empowered, they cannot enjoy security and protection in life. It also provides them with a safe working environment. Empowerment acts as a powerful tool against the exploitation and harassment of women. It is a great means to get adequate legal protection for women. If not socially and economically empowered, women cannot develop their own identities.
Women Empowerment: Key to Social and Economic Growth
Women empowerment can be defined as a process leading to enhancing women’s control over financial, human and intellectual resources in society. In any nation, women’s empowerment can be measured by the extent of their involvement in social, economic and political fields. Women can be made said to be truly empowered only when all the factors such as self-worth of women, their right to control their own lives, and their ability to bring about social change, are addressed simultaneously.
Ground Reality about Women Empowerment: Though women comprise almost half of the total percentages of the world’s population, they are still deprived of their rights in most the developing countries across the globe. Particularly in the South and East Asian nations apart from the African countries, women are leading deprived lives, due to prevalent gender discrimination.
Rural-urban divide: The situation of women in rural areas is more miserable than their counterparts living in urban spaces. It has been widely prevalent that women are mostly deprived of an equal status vis-a-vis men and thus they remain passive beneficiaries in the societies in these countries. They remain powerless, due to their less participation and involvement in the generation of resources critical for development. Therefore, women must become active partners with men, if the goal of women’s empowerment is desired to be achieved in totality. To make the efforts leading to the modernization of any society successful, it is urgent to bring women into the mainstream of development. We need to strike a perfect balance between male and female contributors in rural societies by providing equal opportunities to women without being biased towards men.
Contemporary societies across the world have been exposed to the major processes of transformation on the social and economic development front. However, these processes have not been implemented in a balanced way and have augmented gender imbalances throughout the world in which women remained the ultimate sufferer. The situation has adversely affected the pace of women’s empowerment. Therefore, we require a completely transformed society in which equal growth opportunities can be suitably provided to women so that they can co-exist with their male counterparts contributing equally to all the factors responsible for the growth of society in a larger sense. Playing multiple roles in families, women have already proven their worth, but still, their condition on social and economical fronts has not been up to the mark and in many parts of the world they are forced to lead a miserable life.
Women’s Empowerment is Urgent for Integrated Development
Women empowerment is a must for the betterment of any country’s future as they play dual responsibilities of managing their families while simultaneously juggling to earn to contribute in fulfilling the material needs of their families. No one can ever ignore the importance of the role of a mother, sister, or daughter in their families. At the same time, women have also established themselves as equal contributors in managing the financial requirements of their homes. On the international level as well, women have successfully created their unbeatable position, but they are just a handful in comparison to their not-so-fortunate counterparts.
A Long Way to go: In rural areas, the condition of women is far from satisfactory and their contribution to the economy is also negligible. Though they make up almost 50% of the population of the country, they have not been empowered enough to get equal opportunities in realizing their fullest potential. In such a condition, we can say that our country cannot become a developed nation unless we empower women in the true sense of the term.
