Being a woman!

God hasn’t given us the right to decide upon the gender of offspring. Thanks to him - otherwise the results would have been devastating. God already knew the mind set of his men and the consequences thereof. Still many would-be parents tend to be God and try to know the gender of their child in womb. Though, it is illegal and unbinding as per the law and ethics. Their ideology is to find out whether there is a baby boy or a girl. If boy then it is the joyous session for the entire family; if girl child then it is the matter of concern. Birth of a girl child is an issue of grief because what would a girl bring to the family- neither generations which would take the family name ahead nor monetary gain. They say a girl is a liability after all. Another aspect is the constant threat to her dignity. This is not my personal thinking but an accepted norm since ages.

Domestic violence, molestation, dowry issues, widow re-marriage, child marriage and physical abuse of many kinds are a few problems which many women face during their lives. Reason for facing any sort of abuse is just that she is born as a woman. Is that a crime? She is equally capable of earning for the family nowadays. Isn’t a man born out of a woman?  

Sadly, condition of the woman is deteriorating day by day. It is becoming difficult for her to step out of house unhesitatingly. If recent case of Delhi gang rape was less then there are many more cases being reported on daily basis. They might have not got the same lime light but they are happening on a severe scale. The brutal treatment towards woman is astonishing. The ill will is still claiming the lives. It was reported in newspaper that the numbers of rape cases are increasing dramatically and in multiples in Delhi. Is it a herculean to task to respect a woman’s dignity? I asked 2 of my colleagues about their views about these incidents and their replies were that they are not happy being a woman. This is so unfortunate. Being a woman is a blessing as God considered you good enough to be the one! We can’t let this continue and make our gender suffer with continuing misery and fear.

One cannot imagine the world without women. Stop teasing and molesting women. They are born with huge perseverance, persisting tolerance, patience and strong headedness. They are the idols of forgiveness and love. They are bearing not because they are weak or something. Once they break their silence in a serious way, it would be difficult to stop the alarming wave.

This is not the first time I am writing on this issue… but as it is said that keep protesting or agitating as you never knows when the new dawn rises and results start coming.

Good job is being done by various NGOs and women cells. Activities like protests, campaigns, blogging, camps and many more are definitely an eye opener and helping to spread awareness in various spheres. Still lot of work is left to be done, for which everyone should do his/her individual bit selflessly for the society and world as a whole.


By Aakshi Kalra

Where are the men?

Women suffer Sexual Violence and Rape. Peacetime, Wartime, Anytime.

And the world targets them for rehabilitation, reparation and healing. There are programs for women, education of women, making available healthcare for women, healing for women, fighting justice for women and reparation for women. All good, absolutely – no denying that.

But where are the men, in all of this?

While there is every ounce of pragmatism in involving women in any program that aspires to keep sexual violence and rape at bay, there is an added degree of prudence in involving men in the process of sensitization. Wars involve the perpetration of rape as an easy-to-use-weapon. When the bodies of women become battlegrounds, the future of the country is lost. Women are stigmatized. Consequently, the social institutions of families and procreative alliances break down. Men must be involved in the process of reconstruction by making them realize and understand the fact that there is no wrong on part of the women themselves for having been subjected to rape.

The ideal starting point is to inculcate understanding as to why rape is such an "effective" form of terrorism and genocide. Men must be made taught to understand that Rape does not only affect women but also their children, or, as the case may be, future children. Families must be able to understand the fact that rape has ramifications that affect them as well. Rape and Sexual Violence prevents mothers and wives from fulfilling their normal roles, it disrupts relationships between a husband and wife through the intervention of a spurious worm of distrust. Children suffer consequences as well, and when this happens throughout an entire community it then disrupts normal function of all contributors to that particular economy.

Very rarely do programs working on rehabilitating and avoiding Sexual Violence focus on the effect the incident has on men and their psyche. For starters, it is vital that the responsibility quotient or the blame factor should be tackled. There may be instances where men may feel they wronged their sisters, or daughters, or wives or mothers by not stopping them from being subjected to rape.

The relevance of this modus operandi in most social settings is that everything- be it culture or gender, is learned by imbibitions. When that is the case, if there is a culture of silence and impunity, it only breeds the birth of more harm. Men must not see women who are already raped as easy targets, because, well, they've already been raped. Significantly, it is also a very valid premise to understand that men must be involved in a program that understands that they also have been victimised.

So, again, Where are the men?

Kirthi Gita Jayakumar

When Gender Interferes with Work

When Roli Ekakite (not her real name) reported for her first day at her new job, it was with mixed feelings of trepidation and unease about what the day would be bringing her that overcast Monday morning. Almost five months before, she’d been given this job offer after she had successfully scaled through the whole gamut of the recruitment process, including the mandatory employment medicals. And then, surprisingly, at the end of it all, she had been asked to await confirmation of the date she’d be notified to resume. As the weeks of waiting turned to months, Roli naturally had to go on with her own personal life and aspirations. She got married to her longstanding sweetheart and before you knew it, in came the first early clues of her pregnancy.

Roli’s trepidation on this fateful first day at work arose from her being mindful that as she made to open the door to her new boss’ office, her tummy gave enough hint of her four months pregnancy. Knowing that within the industry in which she was resuming for work the unspoken policy appeared to be not to employ a pregnant woman and knowing also the content of her employment letter which specified a six months probationary period before possible confirmation could be given, Roli, with the thought that she was starting on the wrong footing feared for the worse. And the worse did come. Within moments of her encounter with her new boss, she got a call from Human Resources at her organisation’s head office concerning termination of her appointment.  

Roli’s situation is not an uncommon employment story in many sectors of the Nigerian economy, particularly in the financial sector where prospective employees must undertake the mandatory medicals that are instituted mainly with the view to discovering whether the prospective (female) employee is pregnant or not. Where pregnancy is discovered the female’s recruitment process will be cut short abruptly and she will not be given an employment letter.

It really becomes a jungle out there, especially for the woman who wishes to become the guinea pig to test the weight of the company policy concerning her right to childbearing as a worker within the organisation.

According to the Nigerian labour law, women in government employment and those in the private sector employment are entitled to 12 weeks (now 16 weeks for government workers) maternity leave with at least 50% pay. And more and more organisations especially those in the regulated sectors try to comply with this law. However, the law’s application becomes extremely hazy and subjective when the now commonly practiced “probation period” is thrown into the mix. The laws governing how a company will implement maternity during a woman’s probationary period becomes a really very tricky issue and oftentimes organisations will take the easy route, as happened with Roli, of simply terminating the employment of the female involved.

That it is a workforce dominated by male policy makers, has no doubt skewed policy enactment to disfavour consideration of many of the real circumstances facing the female folk. The male will never find himself in a situation where a decision has to be made about losing or keeping his job based on pregnancy, quite unlike his female counterpart who may have resumed work with him on the same day.

In the case of Roli she got a bit lucky. After several weeks of emotional turmoil caused by the letdown, a very influential relation of hers got to discover what had happened and caused a major uproar at the very top of the organisation. As a result she got reinstated, but only with the condition that she would have unpaid maternity leave and an extension of her probation period by the length of time she spent on maternity leave. For that organisation, it, going forward, became the policy for subsequent employees in the same scenario.

While this resolution to Roli’s situation is better than what used to be in place, the question has to be asked whether this is good enough. Should the womenfolk suffer unpaid wages because they cannot help but be the conduit or progenitor for the human race?

Written By Okechuku Kanu