Women’s equal participation and leadership in all sectors — from home to Parliament — is the need of the hour, dignitaries from different walks of life said on Monday as they stressed the need for collective action to empower women at the grassroots level.
A symposium titled “Bridging the Gender Gap: Challenges & Opportunities for the Next Decade”, which was hosted by the Centre for Equity and Inclusion (CEQUIN), brought together eminent personalities from across sectors, including Lok Sabha MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal, former Rajya Sabha MP Sushmita Dev, economist and senior adviser at National Council of Applied Economic Research Gurucharan Manna, to brainstorm and evaluate the issues concerning women and their representation.
Discussing the recently passed women reservation bill that allots 33% seats for female lawmakers in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, Dev called the move a “hoax”. “The bill is a hoax due to two reasons — the delimitation exercise and the census… Its implementation after delimitation will cause a divide in the seats allotted as there are some states that have failed to control their population while others are performing well on social indices... the bill is stuck in the middle...”
During the event, Shiromani Akali Dal Party MP Badal sought “changes at the grassroots level”. “The country has a tribal woman as President (Droupadi Murmu) and a woman as the finance minister (Nirmala Sitharaman), but symbolism is not going to take the country very far,” she said.
{{/usCountry}}During the event, Shiromani Akali Dal Party MP Badal sought “changes at the grassroots level”. “The country has a tribal woman as President (Droupadi Murmu) and a woman as the finance minister (Nirmala Sitharaman), but symbolism is not going to take the country very far,” she said.
{{/usCountry}}Manna said: “The participation of women is bad in rural areas but worse in urban areas, we need to ask why is it so and then take actions to resolve the issue.”
Independent journalist Revati Laul highlighted the need to bring gender into media beyond the “binaries of rape and violence”. “The gender conversation is the way we look at gender,” she said.
During the symposium, a panel on “The missing growth story of women in the economy”attributed lack of women in workforces to factors like lack of mobility, increased domestic and caretaking duties, and low wages.
Founded in 2009 by Sara Abdullah Pilot and Lora Krishnamurthi Prabhu, Centre for Equity and Inclusion (CEQUIN) works in North Indian states, towards creating gender equitable communities, through a holistic rights-based lens