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International Women’s Day

Kamal Uddin Ahmed
THE International Women's Day (IWD) is being observed today in both developed and underdeveloped countries to underscore women s equal rights and opportunities worldwide. The struggle for realising women rights has a long history.
In 1857, thousands of working women in New York took to the streets to protest against inequitable wages, a 12-hour work day. and sexual nuisance in the workplace. On March 8, 1908, a large number of women assembled in New York City to realise their right to suffrage.
In 1910, as many as 100 women representing 17 countries decided to initiate an International Women's Day at an International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen. Denmark. The first IWD was held in 1911 in Germany, Austria, Denmark and some other European countries. The IWD has emerged as a universal event for celebration.
The United Nations for the first time formally proclaimed International Women s Year on March 8, 1975. Since
then, IWD has emerged as the most important day for women across the world to remember their prolonged struggles and commemorate their social, political and economic achievements.
IWD is an official holiday in more than 15 countries, including China, Russia, and Vietnam. This year's special focus is on "Women and Education," in which w’omen everywhere lag behind. Indeed, women's education is vital to any country's progress, be it social, political or economic.
One of the fundamental principles of state policy is: Bangladesh "shall adopt effective measures for the purpose of establishing a uniform, mass-oriented and universal system of education and extending free and compulsory education to all children." Bangladesh has been spending nearly 10% of its national budget on education. The constitution stipulates that "steps shall be taken to ensure participation of women in all spheres of national life."
Successive Bangladesh governments and women's groups and activists have been striving to ensure equal rights and
opportunities and expand women education. The aim is to ensure that women are properly educated, secured, and free from any violence, oppression, and discrimination. Many pragmatic policy programs undertaken by Bangladesh governments have improved female education to some extent, and women have also been empowered.
For example, in September 2004, with technical and financial support from a consortium of 11 donors led by the Asian Development Bank, Bangladesh launched the Primary Education Development Programme for ensuring "education for all" by 2015.
There are over 81,000 primary-level schools across the country, which are run fully by the government, with around 17.5 million students, of whom about half are girls.
According to a 2007 United Nations Economic and Social Council study, the net enrolment rate of students at the primary level was 87.27%, with 84.63% being boys and 90.14% girls.
Although gender parity has been achieved in primary and lower secondary school enrolments, there have been large dropouts of girl students at the higher secondary level. This is mainly due to socio-economic obstacles, traditional mindsets, biases and attitudes based on gender roles.
According to the World Bank, more than 40% of the country's population lives below poverty line (less than $1 a day) and 35% are unemployed.
Obviously, poverty-stricken families are unable to meet the cost of education of their children. Moreover, in rural areas of Bangladesh, families prefer to educate their sons rather than their daughters.
In the mid-1990s, a female school stipend program was introduced to support secondary education for girls in the rural areas of Bangladesh, which has had a positive impact. However, despite the benefits of the stipend program, there has been a high rate of dropouts of girls at the higher secondary level.
Policy makers and intelligentsia believe that there is still a lack of consciousness among the rural people about the value and importance of women's education.
Nonetheless, the overall achievements and performance of female students in higher education are actually striking. In view of their relatively better grades in the SSC and HSC examinations, in recent years, an ever-increasing number of female students are pursuing higher studies in the public and private universities. For example, female students comprise about 50% of the students in Dhaka University.
On the whole, the performance of the female students is also comparatively better than their male counterparts. Moreover, as of June 2007, women teachers in Dhaka University constituted 26.2% of the total number of teachers. Five years back, female teachers comprised merely about 16%.
Women teachers got their positions through their own educational excellence. A large number of females are also entering the civil service on their own merit. These are some impressive developments in women's empowerment in Bangladesh.
However, if we want to make Bangladesh competitive with rest of the world, further development and expansion of women's education is indis-
pensable. Undeniably, education is the most helpful means for increasing women's self-confidence, enabling them to participate equally and effectively in the development process in a country. For that reason, this year's IWD slogan, "Women and Education," is most pertinent.
Dr. Kamaluddin Ahmed is Professor, Department of Political Science, Dhaka University.