ED: Towards a truly equitable nation

We congratulate the five women who were honoured by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina with the Joyeeta award in recognition of their successes in their respective fields and the positive changes they have brought about in their communities and society at large through their contributions.

The recipients were Helennacha Begum, who successfully educated her nine children with high degrees; Hasina Begum Nila, a successful entrepreneur; Miftajul Jannat, a visually-impaired student currently pursuing her degree at Jahangirnagar University; Rabizan, a freedom fighter who survived the brutal tortures of the Pakistani forces during the Liberation War; and Anjana Bala Biswas, who set up Matrikendra, an organization which creates opportunities for women to become self-reliant through tailoring and handicrafts.

Each of these women not only represents the various ways in which women play a role in our overall development as a society, but also the immense obstacles they have had to overcome in order to ensure that their dreams became reality.

A key emphasis is on education, independence, and survival, all of which, unfortunately, have become struggles for many women, instead of the basic rights they should be.

As such, while these awards are essential to ensuring that women continue to fulfill their potentials as contributors to society or as independent forces which accomplish great things, they should provide us the opportunity to realize the disproportionate number of obstacles which exist to their eventual success, and work towards eliminating them in the future.

Our nation has come a long way in terms of providing opportunities for women to become independent contributors to society, but there is no denying that it still has a very long way to go. Let us work together to change Bangladesh to make it a truly equitable nation.