Women play a veryvital role in human progress and have a significant place in the society. Theyare not at all inferior to men. They are capable of sharing all theresponsibilities of life. Man and woman have been rightly compared to thewheels of the same carriage. Empowerment includes the action of raising thestatus of women through education, raising awareness, literacy, and training.
Women empowerment isreally needed in the society. It’s so important for women’s self-esteem andalso for societies. Empowering women is to give women the rights they deserve.Women have every right to be included ineducation, society, economy and politics.
Though Education hasprimarily helped to remove discrimination against women to a certain extent,but a lot more is required to be done to in the fields of Health, Education andeconomic condition of women.
Celebrating women’sday should actually mean, working towards empowerment of women throughout theyear, celebrating them everyday and showcasing of the achievements on a dayobserved as International Woman’s day.
DistrictAdministration Bandipore has taken some good measures during 2019-20 forbetterment of its female population, like never before. The recent tweets fromMinistry of Women & Child GoI are testimony to this.
One Stop Center(SAKHI) has been established and made functional to provide converged help tovictim women, be it medical help, legal help, counseling, security etc. Thecenter has been aligned to 181 helpline as well. Door to Door awarenessregarding the center is being created to maximize its outreach and minimizeViolence against women. SAKHI as the name suggests is a woman friendly centerand helps victim women to express themselves freely.
District LevelCenter for Women under the Schemes Mahila Shakti Kendra (MSK) standsestablished fully with women welfare officers and coordinators operating frommini secretariat complex Bandipore. Any female can reach the DLCW room number321 and get all information related to woman welfare in different GovernmentDepartments.
“Beti Bachao BetiBadho” has been reoriented in Bandipore with inclusion of two more words”Empowered Beti & Healthy Beti”. The health benefits accrued to girl child& pregnant woman are now being monitored at Panchayat level on real timebasis. The health officers /officials are having the Panchayat-wise base datato improve prenatal and postnatal care. This will further improve onceactivities are rolled out like providing Iron Folic Acid to Girl students,ensuring full registration of eligible couples, pregnant ladies & births,tracking minimum 4 ANCs by ASHAs etc.
Under ICDS sectorholding of Panchayat wise camps by ICDS /ASHA workers has been well takenmaking it as the 25th success story published in “chronicles of change” by theMinistry of Woman & child, GoI. This has helped on administrative front inreconciliation of sex ratio figures maintained by ICDS and Health Departmentsand raising of awareness about female foeticide, importance of Girl child etcamong general public at large. Bandipore has become first district in entireJ&K, where two types of growth charts of girl children are efficientlymaintained by ICDS workers. This shall help in recognising and curing earlymalnourishment & stunting among girl children.
Provision of 36,670LPG connections to women of Bandipore and 16000 IHHLs are another way of makingwomen’s lives easier. The Administration has further enlisted 85 individualbeneficiary schemes for 100% coverage, under which women share shall alsocontribute towards their empowerment.
One feels happy thata strong foundation of women empowerment has been laid in District Bandiporewhich shall raise confidence levels of most of the females , which has primarily been aimed at . Looking forward to andhoping for zero discrimination & maximum women welfare in the Bandipore.
Imtiyaz Ahmad isJoint Director Planning, CPO Bandipore.