Everyday Reflections

This blog post is dedicated to women in our society on eve of International Women’s Day !

I personally have spent my schooling days either in all-boys or co-ed but never had imagined or experienced that we had a kind of divide existent where-in there is unconscious bias in social structures globally with respect to women; may be I was too naive to make that judgement! Here are some anecdotal stories that will build a perspective!

While I start to relate and reflect , it seems how my mother once used to play cricket in good old days but never made to a sporting career ( she ended up on academic side as a teacher beyond just being a house-maker , a wife , a guide to her children ) to present day where Shafali Verma is playing and achieving new heights as part of the India Women Cricket team. Just to remind my readers , Shafali used to dress up as a boy to get opportunity to play ( you can call that progress because my mother would not have even gotten away by dressing up like a boy )

Airports in India ( at least Mumbai where I live ) , offer facility of women cab drivers , but there are explicit counters for it and you are asked about your preference. Think how this signage creates a bias in your mind to have them as driver ? Honestly I have taken the offer to be driven by women cab drivers and found them to be far more careful as well having 10 times cleaner vehicle than their male counter-parts!

My wife who juggles between being a micropreneur and home-maker has made me discover a whole new world of self-empowered women , who are very well educated with double major and are trying to be creative in various fields and carry an identity of their own. You would state that well , is that not good ? . Yes it is but the support infrastructure that is needed for them to juggle their many roles , sometimes questions their effort and makes it transactional and asks how much do you even make by following your passion! ; whilst we should have celebrated the spirit of them being really entrepreneurial !

There are many more such stories that will raise fundamental reflections around gender diversity. Whilst I personally feel that my country which has historically seen very skewed empowerment numbers has taken simple steps to increase symbolism around empowerment ( Read article details ) , there are things that we can do to encourage larger cultural change around us.

We should :

• Reject bias and remove it
• Create empathy and walk-the-talk
• Understand and acknowledge diversity as fact of life
• Stop Judging
• Celebrate success in diversity

Again to all the women out there ! Big Shout-out ! Happy International Women’s Day ! It’s on a Sunday so enjoy it to fullest !

“She believed she could, so she did.” –Unknown