Life
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
Madurai
Thiruvananthapuram
Helping women counter violence
Asha Ramesh —
IT IS the women's lot to remain vulnerable to violence of all kinds. Right from the womb to the tomb, as it were. And, no, this is not about a Carping Cassandra who does no more than bemoan the fate of a woman, or await a stroke of luck to come her way, and count the anniversaries of Women's Day every year.
This is, in fact, someone who believes a woman is empowered, perfectly capable of holding her own against all odds, especially by the law, and the fact that she belongs to the sorority.
And it helps if she is able to access the support services made available for her safety and security, because of the stark reality of foeticide, infanticide, physical violence in the parental home, dowry harassment, and marital violence, not to mention sexual abuse.
Research Associate at the Gender Studies Unit of the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Asha Ramesh, who has just completed a Unifem-funded project and produced a trailblazer of sorts, has, of course, always put women first.
Now, about her directory: It is a comprehensive one providing details of support services to counter violence against women in the State. In English and Kannada, the directory provides addresses and phone numbers of police stations, and senior police officials, the laws pertaining to violence against women, the rights of women, and, of course, a list of organisations, counselling centres and short-stay homes, and vocational training centres. The project covered 13 districts of the State.
For Asha Ramesh, the regret remains that time constraint did not permit her to cover the entire State. She has produced theses that helped address the problems of devadasis, played an active role in the UN Conference of Women in Beijing 1995, and contributed to the Brains Trust that drew up the post-Beijing summit five years later.
In Karnataka, she has studied the impact of reservation for women in panchayat raj institutions.
By Alladi Jayasri
Photo: T.L.Prabhakar.
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Life
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
Madurai
Thiruvananthapuram
|
