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| Amartya seeks rehaul of social values to remove gender bias |
| Press Trust of India / New Delhi Feb 20, 2010, 13:31 IST |
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Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen believes India needs a comprehensive effort to rehaul certain social values besides school education, to address issues of gender bias, deeply ingrained in society.
Speaking at the release of a report on the social, educational, political and health status of youth in India, Sen said the social perception of women in India needs to be changed, both among men and women, to enable empowerment of the fairer sex.
The report, prepared by the Population Council of India, found serious gender gaps in the parameters of education, work status, and economic dependence.
"What is the most shocking and disturbing statistic is that 58 per cent women believe wife-beating is justified in some cases, and a large percentage of women in states like Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, adhere to the belief," he said.
Pointing out that out of the women surveyed in TN and AP, 56 per cent and 88 per cent agreed that wife-beating was justified in some cases, he said, noting that such results in states which have relatively better literacy parameters, showed more needed to be done to change perceptions than mere schooling.
"On the contrary in Rajasthan where relatively lesser number of people go to school, much lower proportion of women agreed to the concept of wife-beating.
"Therefore, this indicates that besides school education, a comprehensive re-examination and overhaul of values is also needed to address such concerns particularly on gender issues," he said.
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