Highlight equal partnership: Ansari

The subordinate condition of women and misogyny in Muslim society are unethical and contrary to the tenets of faith and hence has to change, so that women can participate in the creation of a society that is humane, said former Vice-President Hamid Ansari.

Opening the International Conference on ‘The role of women in making a humane society’ here on Saturday, he said that the society should make effort to produce equality of varying intensity rather than substantive equality. He stressed the importance of the nourishment, education and inculcation of a sense of equality in the girl children and that the principal responsibility was on the parents.

“The traditional societal bias towards patriarchal relationship in the family unit has to give way to relationship of equal partners,” said Mr. Ansari. He also urged the families to encourage girls to participate in sports of their choice and to undertake physical training and yoga.

Earlier, with the help of a few statistics from the Human Development Report of UNDP in 2016, Mr. Ansari said that 34.7% rural and 19.8% urban Muslim women had never attended school while 19% and 11 % respectively had illiterate husbands. Of those who went to school, less than 10% completed schooling. The Muslim women constitute 29% of the total women workforce in the country, he said.

The social mobility of Muslim women was also low. The report said that 75% of them needed their husbands’ permission to engage in almost all activities and that most were unaware of the government schemes for their benefit.

Ultimate say

The Chairman of the Institute of Objective Studies, the organiser of the programme, put across several ideas for the betterment of the women in the community. He said that the women should have the ultimate say in determining the size of the family and that assigning gender roles to women was not right. “Don’t brand them to be docile and obedient. It limits their potential,” he said.

Mr. Afzal Wani, Faculty of Law at GGS IP University, Delhi, in his key note address said that the conference was in fact an admission that the existing society, without the participation of women, was not humane, with all the bloodshed and atrocities happening around.

Mr. E. Aboobakkar, Chairman of Popular Front of India, announced that the organisation was planning to set up a women’s study centre and Hasrat Ayisha Research Library in Kozhikode very soon.

Tamil writer Ms. Salma and Ms. A.S. Zainaba, President of National Women’s Front, spoke on the occasion. The conference concluded on Sunday.