KARACHI: Awareness drives on gender issues emphasised
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Dec 17: A country cannot prosper in true sense if half of its population is not provided with equal opportunities and discriminated on gender basis.
These views were expressed at the inauguration of a three-day workshop on gender justice and development organised by Rahnuma — Family Planning Association of Pakistan on Saturday.
The speakers said that discrimination towards womenfolk started right from childhood at the domestic level where boys are given preference over the girl child in every field and even in education, though the results of various examinations time and again had proved that girls were equally intelligent if level playing field was provided.
They called for launching awareness and capacity building drives, particularly among decision makers, regarding women’s rights leading to gender mainstreaming and protection and safety of victims of violence.
Explaining gender they said that it was a concept that referred to the differences between males and females that were socially constructed, changeable over time and that had wide variation within and between cultures. As opposed to biological characteristics, gender referred learned behaviour and expectations to fulfil one’s image of masculinity and femininity and it was a socioeconomic and political variable with which roles, responsibilities, constraints and opportunities of the people were analysed.
They said that all the government policies, development planning and projects must reflect gender sensitivity and gender awareness of different roles men and women play in societies, differences in their access to and control over resources, and differential impacts of development process on men and women.
Subjects relating to gender and development, gender mainstreaming, social justice and Islam, Islam and gender, etc would be discussed at the workshop on Sunday.
Dr Ali Mohammad Ansari, Khalil Ahmad, Sikander Suhani, Anjum Qureshi, Bilquis Rehman, Amna Qureshi, Anjum Rizvi, and others also spoke.
