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Let the girls be
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Swabhiman celebrates Girl Child Week in New Delhi
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Besides celebrating the Girl Child Week, Swabhiman, an initiative of Smile Foundation, held a series of programme on the girl child at Chattarpur, New Delhi. This included a slogan-writing competition too. The participants came up with interesting
slogans like “Beti desh ki aan hai, do gharon ki shaan hai” and “Meri beti meri shakti”.
The Foundation, with the support of Population Foundation of India, has been working for a number of years for child health and education, women empowerment through various projects. Two-year-old Swabhiman is actively working for women empowerment with a view to evoking self confidence among girls and women.
According to Meena Batra, programme director, women empowerment is the key to gender equality. “This programme is an effort to encourage women to defend themselves and advocates men to accord due dignity to the girl chid. The programme is also designed to enable women to realise their self esteem and potential in every sphere of life”, she added.
Census figures
Speaking on the occasion, Lalitendu Jagatdeb, Joint Director of Population Fund, “We are very much worried with the census figures which clearly indicate that the number of girls are coming down drastically and this will have a big impact on our social structure, but at the same time I am very much encouraged with the efforts of Swabhiman and PFI is planning to replicate the programme throughout the country.”
Addressing the gathering, Nita Malhotra, ACP, Delhi Crime Branch, said, “I am very happy with the work of Swabhiman because the programme has evoked self confidence among girls and women and now they are becoming independent.”
“We should now accept the fact that ‘Meri Beti Meri Shakti’ is the real truth of our life. If we really want to progress in life then we cannot afford to ignore girls and women and we have to delegate rights to them”, said Sudhir K. Rai of Centre for Social Research.
This programme was the culmination of the week-long celebration during which period advocacy campaigns were organised at Chattarpur, Dhaula Kuan, Neb Sarai, New Ashok Nagar, Shashi Garden and Malviya Nagar. In all these locations adolescent girls enthusiastically took part in various competitions and activities.
ZIA UDDIN AHMED
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