Nurturing leadership

Searching for leaders among the women of Gulabgarh. We need women (and girls) with leadership skills, who can help bring more women on board, offering them inspiration through their own acquired skills and progress. Leadership potential is there; it's just a matter of harvesting it and then sharing the fruits.

Not a Country for Women

A recent Spanish documentary entitled "Not a Country for Women," portrays women's role in Indian society and offers horrifying testimonies of what too many women in India are forced to suffer every day. 

Click here to listen to a report (in Spanish) on the radio station Cadena Ser. 

We agree that this country is full of lights and shadows and, as in the words of one of the commentators, we believe that "India has started to follow a course of undoubtable modernization and of gender equality and which will be unstoppable. It is a country that has begun to move forward and it has begun to move forward with women of resilience." (min 37:00)

Indian Women Struggle for Change

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Statistics show that women in India have achieved a great deal in recent years, including a reduction in maternal mortality rates, and an increase in both literacy rates and education levels. However, there is still much to be done to reduce the gender gap. 

In reaction to the gruesome gang rape in Delhi, a protest movement emerged which was born, according to the women who started it, "'of their outraged realization that no matter how accomplished they become, or how hard they work, women here will never fully take part in the promise of a new and more prosperous India unless something fundamental about the culture changes.'"

According to the N.Y. Times article "Indian Women March: 'That Girl Could Have Been Any One of Us'"), "sociologists and crime experts say the attacks are the result of deeply entrenched misogynistic attitudes and the rising visibility of women, underpinned by long-term demographic trends in India." These atttitudes must change.  How, then, can we contribute to this change?

The Women's Literacy Project of Gulabgarh is aware that, no matter how small our effort, we can all help to improve the situation of Indian women and we therefore support whatever measures and efforts must me taken to achieve this aim. In our case, actions begins with increasing the literacy rate among the women of rural areas in Paddar.

Among other things, literacy empowers women by increasing their self-confidence and providing opportunities for them to improve their lives at both a personal and professional level. It also raises awareness, helping women to recognize what their collective needs and rights are, thereby providing them with an essential tool for understanding why this affirmative struggle for change is so important. Finally, literacy can show women how they can remain united in this positive undertaking.

On a positive note, we see that people have joined together in this movement to demand a safer existence for all women throughout India. Let us hope that this union is a long-lasting one, capable of bringing on other greatly needed changes in social attitudes that will close the great gender divide.