Constitution in favour of women, but society is not: Azmi

Mumbai, Jan 13 (UNI) Bollywood actress Shabana Azmi has lamented that ''though our constitution is in favour of women, our society is such that when a boy is born we distribute ladoos and when a girl is born we shed tears''.

Ms Azmi was speaking last evening at the Indian Merchants Chamber, where 'Akshara', an NGO involved with women's rights and gender justice celebrated it's journey spanning over 12 years.

''What we teach our kids in text books is, where is dad?, in the office, where is mom?, in the kitchen. When I took my objections to the Human Resources Ministry they thought I was joking,'' she rued.

'' When I did my film 'Arth,' hordes of women would come to my house and ask me to solve their marital problems. The reason being this that in those days it was unacceptable that a straying husband would come back to his wife, who would not only refuse to forgive him, but also decline to take him back,'' she pointed out.

It is worth mentioning here that according to an UN report, at least 60 million girls are missing mostly in Asia as a result of sex selection, abortion, infanticide or pure neglect.

Besides, approximately 2 crimes are committed against women every hour, one molestation every 3 hours, one rape every three hours, one case of sexual harassment every 6 hours, one kidnapping every 10 hours, one case of domestic cruelty every hour, one suicide of a young woman is recorded every 6 hours and one dowry death every day.

25 per cent of rape victims are below the age of 16, while there are 2 million child prostitutes between the ages of 5 and 15 years.

According to an NIMHANS survey, girls between the age of 6 and 12 years are most vulnerable to abuse and one out of every 10 women reported some kind of sexual abuse during childhood by a known person.

Bollywood actor Rahul Bose said ''I feel that we need to change the definition of 'macho' and 'machoism'. For years we have had this conditioning that men don't cry, they don't show weakness, or feelings, or emotion. In fact,it is the other way round. To be macho is to protect, to always understand others point of view and be sensitive,'' he opined.

''The real challenge lies in changing years of programming and stereotypical society, so that we can be 'real men' and 'real women,' he concluded.

UNI