CHENNAI, Feb 21: Tamil Nadu chief minister M K Stalin on Wednesday unveiled the State Policy for Women-2024 which aims to promote women’s welfare by encouraging their participation in employment and politics, among other pointers.
The policy envisages sharing power in society, economy and politics with women by improving their status and bringing out their hidden and hitherto undiscovered talents, besides creating a safe, healthy and ideal environment for women to live with self-respect.
The document was prepared by the State Social Welfare and Women Empowerment Department and released by Stalin at the Secretariat here. It said that the overall development of the society could be estimated by the development of its women.
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Minister for Social Welfare and Women Empowerment P Geetha Jeevan, chief secretary Shiv Das Meena, secretary of Social Welfare and Women Empowerment department Jayashree Muralidharan, and Social Welfare commissioner V Amudavalli were among those present on the occasion.
“To eliminate gender discrimination, create a safe environment and improve the status of women, the Tamil Nadu government has planned various welfare programmes and has been systematically implementing them to make Tamil Nadu a premier state,” an official release said.
The policy, formulated on lines of the chief minister’s vision of social justice, equality and empowerment of women, will remain in force for 10 years or until the next new policy is formulated. Also, a provision has been made to review it after five years.
“It is noteworthy that very few states in India have so far brought out a separate policy for women development,” the release said.
Some of the key features of policy include establishing a gender-sensitive education system and reducing dropout rate of girl children, improving the health and nutritional status of adolescent girls and women, increasing women’s participation in employment, ensuring safe and conducive workplaces for women workers in all organised and unorganised sectors, supporting women-run small businesses and new business ventures, bridging the digital gender gap by promoting digital literacy for women to gain access to higher paying jobs, reducing the skills gap among women by providing training and skill development in the industry sector, access to corporate credit facilities and facilitate greater availability of bank loans to women in need and encouraging women to participate in the political arena.
“The policy objectives will be achieved through the implementation of initiatives and programmes with the participation of various departments,” it said.
The Department of Social Welfare and Women Empowerment will monitor the implementation of the policy by setting up an ‘Implementation and Monitoring Unit’ at its Directorate. A high-level committee of which the chief secretary would be the chairperson, , along with other departments concerned, would meet once every six months to review the implementation of the Tamil Nadu State Policy for Women and recommend interim amendments, while a district-level monitoring committee headed by the district collectors would monitor the implementation every two months and address challenges if any, the release further said. (PTI)
