Marriyum asks society to empower women at lower level

• State minister asks people to send girls to schools along with male children

ISLAMABAD: State Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb has said that the women who were playing an active role in the empowered society must make efforts to bring forward the women from the backward areas.

Speaking at a ceremony in regards to the International Day of Women organised by the Women Committee of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Pakistan here, she said that the PML-N government had initiated a number of measures to ensure equal rights for women including enrolment of girls in schools under BISP and establishment of coding cloud training institutions to impart skill to the girls who for some reason could not go to school, in collaboration with Microsoft under which 150 thousand girls were graduating annually.

She said that the women also had representation in the parliament where there were 17% reserved seats for women besides 5% quota on general seats which was also supplementing the efforts to empower women. She said that the first phase of empowering the women began at homes and sending girls to schools along with the male children should be the first priority.

Marriyum said that there was imperative need for collective efforts by the society to empower the women at the lower level. She said that the subjects pertaining to women empowerment should be included in the curricula of the primary schools. She informed the audience the PTV Sports channel had launched a programme on women sports to highlight their participation in the sports for the first time adding that media could play a vital role for the rights of women.

She said that the government took serious notice of the regrettable incidents of child abuse in the country recently and a parliamentary committee had been constituted which would suggest necessary legislative measures and other steps to prevent child abuse. She said that the efforts at the federal level were also on the anvil to revise the national curricula which would ensure the strengthening of the process of women empowerment.

Marriyum said that the syllabus of schools should also include subjects on status and importance of women in the society so that the children become part of the endeavours to empower women when they grow up. She said that in addition to that subjects on climate change, environment and other important social issues should also be part of the syllabus so that necessary awareness could be created at the lower level.

She observed that the Women Committee was playing a significant role in promoting the concept of equal rights for women. She said that they should raise voice for the women belonging to areas where opportunities were not available and also make them part of the effort.