Srinagar, Oct 18: “The women of Jammu and Kashmir carry the heaviest burden of the lingering undemocratic rule,” said Jammu and Kashmir National Conference Women’s Wing State President Shameema Firdous on Wednesday.
She said this while addressing a women’s convention at Sher-e-Kashmir Bhawan, Jammu. The convention was organized by Satwant Dogra, Provincial President JKNC Jammu. Ajay Sadhotra, Additional General Secretary, Rattan Lal Gupta Provincial President and Babu Rampal senior NC leader and former minister also attended the convention.
The functionaries who addressed the gathering highlighted the role of the party in ameliorating the socio-political and economic backwardness of women in Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh.
In her address, Shameema said, “Post-2015 situation has been marked by widening gender disparity in the region. Rising unemployment, development deficit and deepening uncertainty have affected everyone in the region but women are the worst sufferers of them. Prevailing political or social issues have had a devastating effect on the dignity and lives of women,” she said, adding, “We in NC deem it incumbent on our part to reduce these inequalities by providing administrative comfort and cushion to our mothers and sisters. I am hopeful we all together can restore the lost dignity of our mothers and sisters in the manner as was envisioned by Madre Maharban.”
“It was Sher-e-Kashmir who brought women of Jammu and Kashmir into the political discourse. It was NC that took it upon itself to change the fate of women of J&K under its revolutionary Naya Kashmir manifesto. In the later decades also, whenever NC was in power, it left no stone unturned to transform its vision of empowering women into reality,” she said
“As contemporary women of Jammu and Kashmir are suffering from more predictable issues as a result of conflict, household violence, dowry, destitution, poverty and unemployment there has been no headway towards bolstering the socio-economic and political prospects of women. The successive governments since 2015 claimed much as an act of tokenism but on the ground, nothing was done to mitigate the suffering of women,” she added.