A Tryst With The Society !

Today is the International Woman’s Day..hmmmm. Pessed up in work…still I managed to keep some time to write this up today…what has been lingering in my mind for quite a while..Men found a good chance of offering roses and cadburys…Ladies and lasses showing off their ethical costumes and fine sets of jewellery display… “Hey, where did you get this from?”…that’s what heard quite often ..on my way to the cafeteria..One more day..in a big list of “day’s” that we have, I thought! These days it has been quite a fashion currently, and in a place like India, where we have a festival every other day, along with the import of the “days”, I suppose we hold the premium position for celebrations..But then they talk of poverty-line and unemployment…oh no! tht’s a different issue altogether…why in this??? Some other day……

I remember a year before when in the last year, we had arranged a programme for the girl students on this occasion..and there I was going around the college, pleading the girls to attend it, with my Vidyarthini Manch incharge questioning me ---“Where are all the girls?”. It had been Saturday..no classes..still most of them were busy. “Oops..My project is in a mess..otherwise definitely…”, “My grandmother is in a hospital..I will be going to attend her”(Same girl I noticed at the cinema house that very eve!..), “I am busy with the assignments and completions”…Ooof!..She could have found a better reason ..I thought!


In the long run, my programme started with some of my dear friends, (who left half-way through for the project..!),some juniors(who are always enthu in the initial years of the college--- my seniors use to say …) the lady staff members and the principal to greet the speaker. The guest was a psychologist and an active worker in woman-related issues…she talked and talked –about almost everything under the sun (related to women)
The baby-girl how she is being brought up, the teens…the marriage, children, role of women as a daughter, friend, wife mother,,etc, etc., the society pressures ..heaven and hell of being a woman! It ended…and I thanked her for making the programme a great success!
Success??? Was it? With most of us being so busy…so busy with our schedules..our roles..our responsibilities—as a …as a girlfriend, as a freak, as an ardent lover of window –shoppings and movies. Huhhh! Aptly, as the speaker noted, ladies these days do not have any time left for “Themselves”. I felt defeated..defeated as a ladies representative, defeated as a girl...it was a sheer defeat of feminity!


They say, youth has the power to change the society…I really wonder what kind of change do we expect when we don’t have enough time for ourselves!
We are not a Rani of Jhansi or The Joan of Arc, an Indira Gandhi or Margaret Thacher! What we are are simple young ladies who can instrument a remarkable change in the society ...in a society where a girlchild requires a fate to be born, to be nourished, educated, allowed to choose her own paths…and at the end allowed to “Live”! Such a contrast…between two ladies--Aishwarya on one hand and the a unfortunate bargirl on the other…, between Kalpana and the girl nextdoor ,who loves to fly …,between me and the mason’s daughter –a 4 year old kid carrying an year old baby brother at the pavement! This contrast is between the different strata of society…what holds good for the lower classes…no better is the condition of the upper class women too..each one with their own problems, unheard untold stories…!


What we plead each Woman’s day…a mere attention of the males towards that half of the population that makes the world? Or reconfirmation and celebration of our feminism…what exactly??? Or a boost and moral buck-up to face more and more challenges that the world offers each day!

You can do anything
you put your mind to...
you can swim the deepest ocean,
and climb the highest peak

You can face adversity
and still walk dauntless

You are strong, beautiful, and compassionate
much more than words could ever say
Today is yours, as any other day!!

"Happy Woman's Day"