Often when a daughter is born in India she is greeted by her family not with joy but with sorrow,

even anger. Even the nurses and doctors, as they pass by, lift up the sheet to check the babys gender

and shake their head to see it is a girl. A boys birth on the other hand, would have been greeted with sweets, shouts, and celebrations. The girl was always an unwanted child, and was

found killed at birth. With the advancement of Science and Technology this killing has only gone still further - for now the girl child is being killed even before birth. This situation is true of the urban area where education and freedom is given to girls - to a great extent, but even this growth of this class does not really bear any testimony to the equality of girls with boys. The rural areas consisting of the major chunk of the Indian population see absolutely no change in the general attitude towards girls. In the villages, girls are not sent to schools and, if at all they are, they drop out after an year or two of schooling. Here, the myth still remains that, education is useless for girls - they have to concentrate on house work, child bearing and child bringing up all through life - and all this, it is believed needs no education. The village people are hard to convince that education of women is as important if not more important than the education of men. To my mind, there is no single package that could improve matters for the girl child/woman except that men change their attitude towards women. Unless men start regarding women as their equal partners, in the growth of humanity this differentiation between men and women shall continue unabated. No single item of achievement like education, profession, legal rights or even the mixture of all these will work out a solution - the only feasible solution is the change of mind, the change of attitude of the men towards women. Till this is done, no amount of teaching, preaching or bargaining will help the girl child. At this juncture when we talk of attitude, I must add that even women have to change their attitude towards the girl child/ women. At least partly women are themselves responsible for their position. As women it is they who pamper their sons and husbands till they begin to believe that they are really superior beings. Let us all, men and women change our attitudes in this regard and, I am sure it will reap pleasant results. A childs education starts from his or her mother at home. In this context what Gandhiji said was true. For he said, If you educate a man, you educate ah individual, but if you educate a woman, you educate an entire family

Countries with high level of basic education do better economically. If India wants to be one of the developed nations it must concentrate on education and especially on female education. The root cause of all problems facing women is related to education. If all women get educated, then all the problems like female infanticide, dowry, female suicides, domestic battering, malnutrition of women, child marriage and other related atrocities would get vanished from our country. Women are strong in showing love, sacrifice and compassion why do we neglect the education of women who are probably the main cause or at least equal cause for running the society with their love, concern and sacrifice The Government alone has not the sole responsibility. Parents too play a major role. Parents should always give encouragement for female education even if they are illiterate. In order to do so we must educate them through street plays, cultural dances and songs in every village, by which they would become aware of their role in the female education and thus they would promote female education. Can we give education to all the women, daughters and sisters in our own family? Then perfect equality would be maintained between men and women. If all these go on smoothly then India would become a developed nation by 2015 in its social, political, economic and cultural realm. Unto that goal let us start educating female children. Education will allow most of the women in this community to be self-dependent and not dependent on others, as is the case right now. In so doing, the girls or women will marry late and care for their children in the proper manner, thereby reducing the problem of early child birth in the community. Families will become smaller and healthier as a result of the women being educated and knowing how to control child birth and malnutrition. Education will also help these women to know their rights and gain the confidence to claim such rights. When a woman is educated she is likely to be in the labour force, which implies that she will be able to assist her husband in running the affairs of the family, thus improving the economic situation of the entire family. This will help the present situation of the women solely being housewives, with little or nothing to contribute to the daily running of their families in this area. There are just so many benefits that education will bring to the lives of women, provided that they decide to be part of the great change.

Knowing how important education is in the life of a woman in particular, as well as the community in general as stated above, it is therefore necessary for the villagers to participate by achieving this great change in our community. In helping to raise local awareness in my community about the importance of girlseducation, I carried out community sensitisation campaigns regarding the advantages of girls education, which have been effective in increasing parent and community involvement in project activities. Additionally, campaigns have proven to be integral in educating girls and young women, as all information is relevant

 I ask you all so earnestly to open girls schools in every village and try to uplift them. If the Conditions of women are raised, then their children will, by their noble actions, glorify the name of the Country. Swami Vivekananda Swami Vivekananda has rightly said, Educate your women first and leave them to themselves, then they will tell you what reforms are needed. Education for a girl child means making the next generation well educated, full of virtues, free from the useless superstitions, confident and capable to do something good for the family, for the society and for the country as a whole. The present day girl is the mother of tomorrow. Give me good mothers and I will give you a great nation Napoleon

Often when a daughter is born in India she is greeted by her family not with joy but with sorrow, even anger. restore the dignity and equality of women and girl children in India. measure the progress of a community by the degree of progress which women have achieved. A society and a nation cannot progress without the development of its women. More countries have understood that womens equality is a prerequisite for development When women thrive, all of society benefits, and succeeding generations are given a better start in life.

. On discovering the baby is a girl the disappointment is palpable and total. Celebrating
womanhood is not about celebrating the fact that women like Jhansi ki Rani, Indira Gandhi, Mother Teresa or Pandita Ramabai have had great impact on our nation or achieved great things, but it is to celebrate womanhood itself.

At least in India, the girl child has been a topic of discussions and debates for the past several decades but, even today, the position appears to remain unchanged. The girl was always an unwanted child, and was found killed at birth. With the advancement of Science and Technology this killing has only gone still further - for now the girl child is being killed even before birth. The present scenario in which the girl child is mercilessly killed even before birth, does not speak too well about the fate of this species. The scenario is so varied that, it is really difficult to understand what we are really doing or trying to do in this regard. On the one hand we see girls entering in the fields of all kinds of professions holding senior positions in offices, becoming engineers, doctors, managers etc. We are obviously impressed and are likely to believe that, the position of the girl is now after all not too bad.

However, the complexity of the problem becomes malicious when we see that, together with girls entering professions there is a simultaneous and continuous rise in the graph of crimes against women. Why and how do these two sides of the same problem co-relate, is a mind-boggling situation. This situation is true of the urban area where education and freedom is given to girls - to a great extent, but even this growth of this class does not really bear any testimony to the equality of girls with boys. The rural areas consisting of the major chunk of the Indian population see no - yes absolutely no change in the general attitude towards girls. In the villages, girls are not sent to schools and, if at all they are, they drop out after an year or two of schooling. Here, the myth still remains that, education is useless for girls - they have to concentrate on house work, child bearing and child bringing up all through life - and all this, it is believed needs no education. The village people are hard to convince that education of women is as important if not more important than the education of men. In the village, the girl child has no say in anything in the home, not even things of her own concern she is, even to-day in the 21st Century treated as an object to be used instead of an individual human being with all the ingredients of human beings - like her counterparts - the boy. She, even today remains to have the status of an object to be used or dispensed with at the whims and fancies of her male family members. With this psyche of the average Indian adult, I personally see no light at the end of the dark tunnel. In my view, even for the urban areas, the prospects of the girl child are not too bright as, even while women are acquiring status and positions in the office - firstly, they do not get the respect the male counterparts get in the offices. Besides no matter what status a woman may achieve outside home, inside the home she, by and large remains a chattel. When this is the ground reality of the girl at home and outside home it appears that, even education and financial independence have not helped women really enhancing their status vis-^-vis the status of men. Let us analyze as to why this peculiar situation persists and how we should deal with it. My personal view is that the rise of women and the crime against women going hand in hand is a paradox but not difficult to understand. It is very clear that, the men who have held the fort single handedly for centuries, would obviously not like to give up their importance, or even share it with women. It is they who resent this rise of the heads of women and so, before women rise to unchallengeable heights the ogre of man wants to crush them. This he does by using his God gifted physical strength and it is this reason that, crimes against women are now on the rise. The woman who was earlier battered because she was considered a

lesser being is now being battered, because she is potential challenge to man's unquestioned supremacy through past several centuries. Thus, the position remains unchanged even after education and financial independence. To my mind, there is no single package that could improve matters for the girl child/woman except that men change their attitude towards women. Unless men start regarding women as their equal partners, in the growth of humanity this differentiation between men and women shall continue unabated. No single item of achievement like education, profession, legal rights or even the mixture of all these will work out a solution - the only feasible solution is the change of mind, the change of attitude of the men towards women. Till this is done, no amount of teaching, preaching or bargaining will help the girl child. At this juncture when we talk of attitude, I must add that even women have to change their attitude towards the girl child/ women. At least partly women are themselves responsible for their position. As women it is they who pamper their sons and husbands till they begin to believe that they are really superior beings. Let us all, men and women change our attitudes in this regard and, I am sure it will reap pleasant results.

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