Women - Burden or Backbone? My reflections....

The below is my entry to the Indusladies 4th Annual International Women’s Day Blog Contest!

Enough is said and written about the women liberation and empowerment in this era. Are we really? This isn't directed to a few amongst us who are so-called cultured, classy and sophisticated; who shops for groceries on-line, splurges on branded stuff, sends their kids to high-end schools and delights in either a kitty-party or a day out. Honestly, I don’t mean to humiliate those who are fortunate enough to indulge into these extravagances but what about those, whom we face each day, observe them suffering, die a horrifying death each night only to face the morning with much gusto and yet their feet firmly into the ground of realism through an abstract power to survive. Yes, I am referring to our maids, those abandoned mothers at some shady old-age homes, some homeless women roaming on the streets seeking compassion and benevolence, those little daughters physically abused each hour and those incalculable girls and women raped every fleeting second.

A woman has the greatest supremacy – the power to give birth, the power to take this human race frontward. And while we may claim that this is her prevalent forte, there are cases where the same woman is tortured and enforced to abort the foetus just because it’s a girl - another woman, in a sense! I am a born optimist. I do believe that women are undoubtedly the backbone of not just their own families but the entire human race. However, when I read about the female foetus being dumped in the trash, it irritates me; when I hear about another woman raped, it enrages me and it’s absolutely sickening when I hear cases about fathers molesting and abusing their own daughters.

Just barring a few examples, I believe we have to go far afield in accomplishing that much warranted deliverance, respect and affection for the womankind. I and you are perhaps just fortunate to have been born in the non-toxic and comfy zone we spent our childhood in, to have been married to the man who respects and cares and to have been blessed with a father, brother or a son who would lay their own lives to protect us from any odds. But each morning, when I welcome my maid along with those fresh bruises on her body (courtesy her drunkard, good-for-nothing husband) and watch her struggle for survival to meet the needs of her two useless grown-up sons and yet live a life that’s dedicated to everyone else except herself, my faith in our Goddesses Durga and Kaali shakes a bit.

Not every woman is likely to be Indra Nooyi or Sonia Gandhi or Angelina Jolie but should that stop her from being respected, valued, appreciated and loved and cared for? And when each among us is conferred with these basic moralities, just then we can proudly say that the human race has truly shed that extra burden and women are without a doubt, the backbone! 

Touché …