Women's Equality Day: Progress made, but challenges remain

Sowmya Raju | NT

Bengaluru: As we celebrate Women's Equality Day today, equality is a topic that has been debated for centuries.

In India, there has been significant progress in recent years towards achieving gender equality, but there is still much work to be done.

To get a better understanding of the current state of women's equality in India, News Trail spoke to women from different walks of life.

Their views were somewhat contradicting, but they all agreed that there has been progress and that there is still a long way to go.

Challenges that remain

Despite the progress that has been made, there are still many challenges that women face in India. One of the biggest challenges is violence against women.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau, there were over 33,000 cases of violence against women reported in India in 2020 alone.

This includes rape, sexual assault, domestic violence, and dowry-related violence and even eve teasing.

According to UNICEF, there are still 12 million girls in India who are not enrolled in school. And, according to the World Health Organization, India has the highest maternal mortality rate in South Asia.

A woman from Bengaluru who wished to remain anonymous spoke out against the notion that women receive unfair advantages.

She challenged men to consider whether they have ever had to cross the street to avoid a creep, plan a self-defence move while walking alone at night, or share their live location with friends and family while travelling alone.

If men have ever experienced any of these things, she said, she would gladly give up the "unfair advantages" that she supposedly enjoys. Women face many challenges in the workplace, including discrimination.

They are often paid less than men for doing the same work, and they are less likely to be promoted to leadership positions. While workplace discrimination is still a problem, some workplaces are making progress in creating more equal opportunities for women.

For example, one IT professional said that her workplace does not discriminate on the basis of gender in terms of salary or promotion. She also noted that women are given night shifts just as often as men.

This is a positive step towards gender equality in the workplace. However, the IT professional also acknowledged that the patriarchal mindset in many Indian households will continue to hold the country back for centuries when it comes to equality.

Women's equality is not just about being treated equally to men, but also about being treated equally by other women.

Sharing her experience with her rented home Abhipsa Mohanty shared that she was harassed by her landlady for little-est things just because she was a single girl living alone.

She said, “Women need to respect other women and treat them as equals first.” Jayapriyanka opines that the whole idea of equality has become so bleak and blurry and most people don't even understand the meaning of the word.

She said, “When everyone's celebrating Barbie for its strong views on Feminism, I find it problematic as it pushes equality to the back seat. An equal society refers to a world where men and women get equal opportunities to grow, equal pay for the same work, equal chances to pay the bills on a date and basically equal rights to have enough choices in life.”