The reward of an honest girl Story

The Status of Women in Bangladesh

The status of women in Bangladesh is not as low as it was years back. It is also not as high as it is in various developed countries. Now-a-days women are allowed to participate in all spheres of activity of the society. They have access to the parliament. They can participate in politics directly. They are doing jobs in government as well as non-government offices. They are shopping and doing many other things without degenerating their social and family status at all. These examples imply that women have been given sincere liberty to participate in the social activities.

But this has been possible only for the handwork and preaching of various prophets, great men, scholars and other leaders for many centuries. It is also a fact that preaching and propaganda may reach all the people of a society. But they are not effective for everyone. For example, people with little or no education are vulnerable to superstitions. They are unable to accept the new replacing the old. They cannot ignore and resist the new or revolutionary ideas. Many people live in the remote villages. The light of knowledge and education has seldom reached here. So they are still in favour of encaging women in the home. They restrain their social participation and intellectual movement.

Women have not yet achieved a good status in such backwaters. It is again proved by the existence of the dowry system there. Dowry results in physical and mental torture of women often death included. Why should a man be paid money only because he is going to marry her? True, a woman is entitled to her share of her father's and mother's properties. But in most of the cases, it has little relationship with dowry. Again, what should happen to these women whose fathers have nothing or very little to offer her during her marriage? Unfortunately, the dowry-hunters seldom ask themselves such questions. As a result, an inhuman torture is upon the women.

As human beings, women should have a status equal to that of men. There can be no controversy about it. But it does not mean that this needs to be overdone. Regrettably, for example, some women's movements are seen which demand men's status for women. Such an effort is laughter-arousing and maliciously provocative. Men are men and women are women. They have different social and family roles. But in some cases, those roles may be overlapping.

However, women are indispensable to men and men are indispensable to women. Their relationships are complementary. So it is impossible to separate women from the men. Similarly, it is absurd to strive for replacing one by the other. When we launch any movement or enact laws, we should bear in mind this universal truth.

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