Empowerment can be defined as a “multi-dimensional social process that helps people gain control over their own lives by unshackling them from all negative aspects which surrounds them. Women empowerment refers to actions and plans to make women more self-assured of their ability to make strategic life choices”. With this theorem, empowerment becomes central to the process of reaping benefits to women at an extensive level. It involves the action of boosting the status and standards of women through literacy, education, by training and raising awareness. Hence, women empowerment is all about allowing and equipping women to make life - determining choices across different issues in the country. It is a step towards incorporating confidence and self-worth within by making them independent and self-reliant. Born in destitute regions, these otherwise talented and workaholic women remain dormant and stagnant under patronage of their male counterparts.
Today women’s lifelong financial wellness is at a tipping point. Thanks to a seismic shift toward women’s growing personal and financial power, they are poised to move into true financial independence, enjoying all the freedom that it brings. Yet there is still a trail left to blaze. Women are living longer than ever before, and funding that longevity has truly become a women’s issue.
Women empowerment is not a new concept and the need for the same was realized much earlier, even before independence. Not only in India but all over the world, women are facing atrocities in almost all the spheres of their life, primarily based on the gender roles devised by the society. Since beginning, they are conditioned and taught to be enslaved under men, yet another life-dictum formulated for them. Women have suffered beyond extremes all through the years at the hands of men. In the ancient times, they were treated as negligent entities or non-existent inanimate objects at large and were coined as a mere second sex. As the community had been driven predominantly by men, even basic rights like Right to Vote were also proscribed. As the times evolved, women realized the effect of barbarity and began to participate in the revolution for women empowerment. As women were not allowed to make decisions for them, the radical conviction of empowering the homemakers came in like a breath of fresh air. It made them aware of their rights and how they must secure their own place in society rather than being dependent and reliant on men. It came to be recognized as a fact that systems cannot simply work in someone’s favor based on their gender, i.e. men are not licensed to enjoy authority on grounds of sexual orientation. However, we still have a long way to go when we talk about the reasons why we need it.
Need for Women Empowerment
“Women are the real architects of society.”
Most of the countries, no matter how progressive they are and how modern their civilization is, women in gross normality have suffered, oppression, abuse, discrimination, hounding and condescending attitude of male representatives in their families. In other words, women from all over the world have borne the brunt of inequality and disproportionate prerogative thus, making them take a rebellious route to reach the status they enjoy today. While the western countries are still progressing, third world countries like India still lack behind in providing enough standards of honor and respect which must be given to women as a differing species of homo sapiens than men. Women Empowerment is, therefore, an instrumental in establishing an ideological hierarchy and a step towards raising awareness of componential factors pertaining to women's subjugation.
Right to education and acquire professional skill set is yet another challenge that a woman incessantly addresses. Higher education for many is still a dream as other marital and familial obligations are posed right in front of her. Many young girls in the remote and rural areas of the country are married off at a very early age. Men even today, are still a dominating and persona who intimidates the opposite gender reflecting their superiority and supremacy. It’sa woman’s duty to work and serve for males in her family and outside at her workplace endlessly, stay subjected physically and mentally all her life. Men do not let them have their fair share of freedom and responsibility of any kind which desiccate them from inside.
In addition to it, domestic violence is a major and the most prevailing issue in India. Men lace into their wives and abuse them showcasing their mastery over them like a ‘vet for a pet’. Men are believed to have a tyrannizingand domineering voice, more so, because women are afraid to speak up. Similarly, women who do the work get paid less than their male counterparts. Ideally, it is downright unfair and considered as a sexist attempt to pay someone lesser for the same amount ofjob due to gender difference. Thus, we see observe, learn and inherit from the day to day societal behavior towards women why empowerment is crucial and a pressing need nowadays. We need to equip these women with courage, confidence, and opportunity to speak up for themselves and never to become victimized or traumatized.