Janani Janmabhumishcha Swargadapi Gariyasi (Mother and motherland are even more important than getting two heavens, by doing good deeds). These are the ethos of the land which is known to have a long tradition of equal love, respect and care to feminism. The tide of time and onslaught of varying degrading ideals did harm the harmonic balance of Indian society too. Yet, as we celebrate International Women’s Day today, India indeed has undergone a rapid massive change where the status of women now stands more pedestaled in terms of entrepreneurship, working conditions, security, benefits, awareness and opportunities.
Recent years have seen launch of many helpline numbers to assist women, various schemes aimed at raising awareness, better social promotion, more jobs, improving sex ratio and education status, more participation in fields of business, finance, science, judiciary, and especially in politics and sports. Recalling the beginning of such a tidal change, ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padhao’ is the first scheme that comes to the mind, an empowering initiative through which India has been able to work towards eradication of female foeticide and make girls socially and financially self-reliant through proper education. Another unique initiative is ‘Mahila-E-Haat’, a bilingual online marketing platform, which helps aspiring women entrepreneurs, self-help group and NGOs to showcase their products to the world. In 2017, GoI launched Mahila Shakti Kendras which acts as an interface for rural women so that they can approach the government to avail their entitlements through training and capacity building.
‘One Stop Centre Scheme’, popularly known as ‘Sakhi’, had come into being in 2015 with the ‘Nirbhaya’ fund to provide shelter, police desk, legal, medical and counseling services to the victims of violence. The STEP programme (Support to Training and Employment Programme) is providing skills and competencies to women, leading to employability and assisting them in various sectors like agriculture, horticulture, handicraft, computer handlooms, tailoring, skilling like spoken English, IT- computer, travel-tourism, hospitality, etc. Several financial programmes have also been launched by the government for women’s financial empowerment. Women entrepreneurs are being encouraged to take up challenges, initiatives and explore various possibilities lying all around. These include Mudra Loan for Women, Annapurna Scheme, Stree Shakti Yojana, Dena Shakti Scheme, Bhartiya Mahila Bank Business Loan, Mahila Udyam Nidhi Yojana, Orient Mahila Vikas Yojana Scheme, Cent Kalyani Scheme, Udyogini Scheme among others. To empower women, Government of India has taken many other important measures which include Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban & Rural), the National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), Ujjwala Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Vyay Vandana Yojana (PMVVY), Scheme for Adolescent Girls (SAG) supporting women and girls to be socially secure, the initiatives like Samagra Shiksha, Scheme of National Overseas Scholarship, Babu Jagjivan Ram Chhatrawas Yojna, Swacch Vidyalaya Mission to ensure that schools are girl-friendly especially for vulnerable sections of society and have adequate facilities in place to fulfill their special requirements.
Continuous encouragement being given to women, has resulted into countless women becoming parts of various sectors and services including defence. Women have also started dominating the corporate world enjoying all kinds of heights like CEO. Last year 2021, four women from India figured in Forbes list. Nirmala Sitharaman, Finance Minister, India stood at 37, Roshni Nadar Malhotra, Chairperson, HCL Technologies ranked 52, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairperson, Biocon was at 72, and Falguni Nayar Founder & CEO, Nykaa figured at 88 in the list. However, Indian origin Kamala Harris, US Vice-President figured second in this list of 100 most powerful women in the world.
Clearly, all women-centric programmes are meant to encourage their participation in all kinds of activities including formal economy. For mothers and sisters of India, International Women’s Day needs to be looked at as a challenge to strive and become tall personalities of hope, compassion and success. With their tremendous work done in this country and abroad, they need to break the stereotype of only a housewife and become International women.
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