The State Minister for Women and Children’s Affairs, Shirin Sharmin Chowdhury, let it be known recently that the government plans to announce its National Women’s Development Policy soon. The revival of the post-Beijing, CEDAW-inspired 1997 policy, for which progressive women activists have been struggling over the past many years, seems most likely. Hopefully, that would [...]

INTERNATIONAL CEDAW Day was observed on September 3. The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is the most important international instrument for protecting women’s human rights, and more than 185 countries of the world are signatories. Bangladesh signed this convention on November 6, 1984.
But there are two articles on [...]

Our national poet Kazi Nazrul Islam wrote- the Good done by the civilization, half created by man and rests by the women. This is an eternal statement about the development of human civilization. From the dawn of the civilization women and men worked together to make the future brighter.
In a certain point of the social [...]

Empowerment of women is a process through which women in general and poor women in particular get the opportunity to join the workforce, contribute to family income, and have a place in family as well as social affairs. In the past women were segregated from out-of-home productive work. They were kept within the four walls. [...]

India’s newly-elected parliament began its inaugural session Monday with lawmakers set to elect the country’s first ever woman speaker, who is also an “untouchable” Dalit.
Veteran and first-time MPs, including 78 ministers of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s cabinet, were sworn in by an interim speaker at the start of the brief session that ends on June [...]

President Zillur Rahman yesterday stressed the need for establishing women’s chamber of commerce and industry in every district to involve women entrepreneurs in the mainstream development process. Rahman made the observation when an 11-member delegation of Bangladesh Women Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BWCCI) led by its president Selima Ahmed called on him at Bangabhaban. [...]

What do women do now? During the 1970s or 80s, may be teaching and nursing were largely female professions. Things have changed; women dominate several more occupations now a day, like lawyers, physicians, bankers, journalists, economists, psychologists, consultants, college/university professors and many more. Even the share of IT professional and scientists is growing to some [...]

Empowerment of women is a process through which women in general and poor women in particular get the opportunity to join the workforce, contribute to family income, and have a place in family as well as social affairs. In the past women were segregated from out-of-home productive work. They were kept within the four walls. [...]

As recently as 1991, the educational attainment of Bangladeshi women was among the lowest in the world.  Eighty percent were illiterate.  Equipped with few skills and uninformed about health care, family planning, and nutrition, they were trapped in a cycle of dependency.
To ensure that school-age girls, especially those in rural areas, receive an education, the [...]

The physically challenged women have demanded their representation at all tiers of governance from the union parishad to the national parliament.
They made the demands in separate programmes including a press conference and human chain formation organised here Saturday and Sunday to press their demands of ensuring one reserved seat for them in the parliament from [...]

Prime Minister (PM) Sheikh Hasina Thursday said that her government was playing a leading role for ensuring empowerment and rights of women. 
She made this remark when the Ambassador of Netherlands in Bangladesh Berendina Maria paid a courtesy call on Sheikh Hasina at the Prime Minister’s Office.

POLITICAL thinkers are of the view that the role of women in the 9th parliament will be greater than before. This could be a reality because around 40 women candidates are contesting in the election. Justifying their role in national politics and the decision making process is really a great challenge for the women in [...]

Chief Adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed yesterday said strict application of law is equally essential as change of mindset, values and morality is necessary to check repression on women.
The head of the caretaker government made the remark at a function organised by the Women and Children Affairs Ministry at the Osmani Memorial Auditorium for distributing Begum Rokeya [...]

Speakers at a day-long workshop here Sunday called for making the womenfolk politically empowered in the greater interest of enhancing their self-confidence, which would ultimately contribute to the efforts for further progress and prosperity in the country.
They said there is no alternative to making the women self- dependent to carry forward the nation’s hopes and [...]

Women have to be brought into the mainstream of national development process through economic and political empowerment in order to accelerate poverty alleviation in the country.
At a roundtable in the city yesterday, women leaders and politicians said only strong political will can succeed in making women’s empowerment a reality by eliminating all kinds of violence [...]