If you ask me, what I think about the women's reservation bill passed in the Indian parliament today...three simple words describe my state of mind..."I feel insulted"...period...
Oh yeah...you are most welcome to shout out abuses at me for not supporting the cause of women in India...but the fact remains, I feel insulted...
Blame it all on having being born into a privileged family, where I have never been discriminated against because of my gender...a life in which, I have been taught to value and cherish education and the power of choice...I agree that I may just be missing the point...I may just be ignorant of how 'reservations' for different sections has helped the Indian society progress in the past...maybe some of you could throw more light on that...perhaps the bill is really a beacon all set to light the path for empowering Indian women in politics and other arenas...I really haven't bothered to understand the nitty /gritty details of the bill...and I absolutely realize that my opinion is clouded by my relatively privileged upbringing...but the fact remains that as a woman, I feel insulted...not empowered, now that it's been offcially stamped that women are the weaker sex in the country of my birth...
Personally I feel the need for reservations for any section of the society, gender based or otherwise, spells the failure of a system and the society, at large to faciliate the progress and development of that specific section of people...rarely, if at all, does it empower the system and its people...
So far, in life, whatever major decisions I have taken, are the outcomes of choices that I have made...what I want to study, where I want to live, whom I want to marry, what I want to do with life in general...and whatever I have achieved or not achieved, in life, is because of my merits and demerits and the choices that I have made...not because of favors and disfavors that have been meted out to me...what makes me feel empowered is being given those life choices and being held accountable for them...
What Indian women need is the power that comes with education , the opportunity of making educated choices and being given the respect for a choice that's been consciously made...'respect for a choice that's been consciously made' is particularly important here...
Given the choice between pursuing extraordinary career options and being a housewife, if a woman chooses the latter...She should be respected for it, not stereotyped...
Given a choice between pursuing extraordinary career options and being a housewife, if a woman chooses the former...She should be respected for it, not reprimanded for being over ambitious...
Given a choice between studying the arts and sciences, if a woman chooses the latter...She should be respected for it and allowed to do so on her merit...
Given a choice between studying the arts and sciences, if a woman chooses the former...She should be respected for it and not looked down upon based on some preconceived, stereotypical notion of lack of merit...
Given a choice between bearing and rearing a child out of wedlock and letting go, if a woman chooses the former...she should be respected for her courage to singlehandedly bring up a child, not accused of irresponsibilty without being given a chance to prove otherwise...
Any self respecting person, be it a man or a woman, will tell you that there is no greater inspiration, motivation and feeling of euphoria than that which is achieved based on one's merit, intelligence, smartness and hardwork...that's an indisputable fact...any person who has reached the pinnacle of success in an arena of work or society, and has been favored by some form of reservation to do so, can never feel or be equal to someone who has done so solely on merit...be it a man or a woman...there is nothing more to it...so where does the illusion of 'empowerment' really come from ??!!! I don't have an answer...perhaps you do?
