District Meeting on Women and Adolescent Empowerment
Women constitute almost 50% of the world’s population but India has shown disproportionate sex ratio whereby female’s population has been comparatively lower than males. As far as their social status is concerned, they are not treated as equal to men in all the places. In the Western societies, the women have got equal right and status with men in all walks of life. But gender disabilities and discrimination are found in India even today. The paradoxical situation has such that she was sometimes concerned as Goddess and at other times merely as slave. Gender gap exists regarding access to education and employment. Rural women are more prone to domestic violence than that of urban women. A large gender gap exists in political participation too. The study concludes by an observation that access to education and employment are only the enabling factors to empowerment, achievement towards the goal, however, depends largely on the attitude of the people towards gender equality.
Women’s empowerment is the process of empowering women. Women's empowerment is all about equipping and allowing women to make life-determining decisions through the different problems in society. Women's empowerment and achieving gender equality is essential for our society to ensure the sustainable development of a country.
Youth empowerment is achieved through participation in youth empowerment programs. However, scholars argue that children's rights implementation should go beyond learning about formal rights and procedures to give birth to a concrete experience of rights. There are numerous models that youth empowerment programs use that help youth achieve empowerment. A variety of youth empowerment initiatives are underway around the world. These programs can be through non-profit organizations, government organizations, schools or private organizations.
Youth empowerment is different from youth development because development is centered on developing individuals, while empowerment is focused on creating greater community change relies on the development of individual capacity. Youth empowerment programs are aimed at creating healthier and higher qualities of life for underprivileged or at-risk youth. The five competencies of a healthy youth are: positive sense of self, self- control, decision-making skills, a moral system of belief, and pro-social connectedness. Developmental interventions and programs have to be anchored on these competencies that define positive outcomes of healthy youth.