Women empowerment

Women’s empowerment can be defined to promoting women’s sense of self-worth, their ability to determine their own choices, and their right to influence social change for themselves and others.

It is closely aligned with female empowerment – a fundamental human right that’s also key to achieving a more peaceful, prosperous world.

In Western countries, female empowerment is often associated with specific phases of the women’s rights movement in history. This movement tends to be split into three waves, the first beginning in the 19th and early 20th century where suffrage was a key feature. The second wave of the 1960s included the sexual revolution and the role of women in society. Third wave feminism is often seen as beginning in the 1990s.

Women’s empowerment and promoting women’s rights have emerged as a part of a major global movement and is continuing to break new ground in recent years. Days like International Women’s Empowerment Day are also gaining momentum.

But despite a great deal of progress, women and girls continue to face discrimination and violence in every part of the world.

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 with regard to their education, career, profession and lifestyle.

With steady increase in the number of working women, they have gained financial independence, which has given them confidence to lead their own lives and build their own identity. They are successfully taking up diverse professions to prove that they are second to none in any respect.

But while doing so, women also take care to strike a balance between their commitment to their profession as well as their home and family. They are playing multiple roles of a mother, daughter, sister, wife and a working professional with remarkable harmony and ease. With equal opportunities to work, they are functioning with a spirit of team work to render all possible co-operation to their male counterparts in meeting the deadlines and targets set in their respective professions.

Women empowerment is not limited to urban, working women but women in even remote towns and villages are now increasingly making their voices heard loud and clear in society. They are no longer willing to play a second fiddle to their male counterparts. Educated or not, they are asserting their social and political rights and making their presence felt, regardless of their socio-economic backgrounds.

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 attitudinal change in society with regard to 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.

Let us hope, women empowerment spreads to progressive as well as backward areas of our vast country.Women empowerment adds to 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.

They are able to lead their lives with dignity and freedom

It adds to their self esteem

It gives them a distinct identity

They are able to gain positions of respect in society

As they are financially independent they are able to spend on all their needs and desires

They are able to make meaningful contributions to the well-being of society

They act as capable citizens to make the country achieve enhanced Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth

They get fair and equitable access to resources of the country