If we look closely at any nation around the world, the status of women is a strong indication of the health and well-being of the society and its people. Were women suffer, the community as a whole suffers; there are more cases of crime, poverty, and social repression against all castes and creeds. When women have opportunity to succeed, then the success of the nation increases dramatically; children are educated, the homeless are taken off the streets, and nationality is honored.

Aside from the obvious advantages of equality between men and women, developing public and social rights for women directly affects global health, education, and prosperity, creating balance within the whole human population. The facts are their and the statistics prove this to be true! So we must strive to give women the right to pursue their dreams and represent their nation with pride. Women should never feel limited by social restraints, especially if they wish to pursue education or health for themselves and their families.

Research has proven that educating women is an affective way to reshape and recondition the social and political state of a country. Educating women directly affects the society as a whole, and as women are educated cases of abuse, forced labor, and even sex trading are reduced on a large scale. So it is no wonder that we at CFI are devoted to educating women in India and providing them with the resources they need to create their successful lives.

India is well known for it social caste system, and some of the people who suffer most from unfair biases are women. Although women in India carry great responsibilities in their lives, supporting their extended families, working labor intensive jobs, and raising their children, very few women in lower class communities are actually acknowledge for their tireless work and love. There are many cases throughout India where women are sold as slaves for business men or sex, and much of this activity is justified through the caste system and sex based discrimination against poor women.

Unfortunately in India and throughout other third world countries, women are considered the weaker sex. In many households women are considered incapable of managing the important decisions with the family, including money. This is why so many women in India are neglected and stripped of social and familial rights including the right to education, the right to family inheritance, and the right to choose their destiny. This has left many women homeless, jobless, and helpless to act and take control of their very own lives.

At CFI we are taking a number of steps to change this outrage against women and with the support from people like you we are going to help change the future for the global community of women.

For additional information about women in India click on the statistics tab at the top right of this folder.

The following are major areas where women in India are subjugated, marginalized, and discriminated against based upon gender:

1. Lack of Choice: Many women are forced into a life chosen by their parents that is often the life of a future housewife.
2. Unequal job opportunity and salary: work available to female employees is significantly less than that available to men. Women also get paid a fraction of what men get for the same amount of work (applies particularly to lower class, labor intensive jobs). On average, lower class women work longer hours, and their main sector for employment is unskilled agricultural jobs like tending to the crops and livestock.
3. Poor education: many women do not receive proper education primarily due to social practices and stigmas related to educating women. On average, young girls that do get an education are taken out of school at a young age to begin work inside their homes. Women that are able to complete a full education through undergraduate training may find it difficult to find opportunities available to women.
4. Chastisement if Widowed: Women in many circumstances are abandoned after the death of their husbands, especially if they are younger women, and rejected by both their communities and their families and can be left to fight for themselves and their children without any support.
5. Female Infanticide: Killing female babies or fetuses because of low social status accorded to women and the desire to have a male baby. This is a growing issue in India and continues to occur throughout the country.
6. Malnutrition: Indian tradition upholds a rule where women eat last during meals. For lower caste families where their is a lack of food, many women do not get sufficient amounts of food which leads to malnutrition.

Literacy Rate in Madurai, major city in Southern India

This is a very basic look at the literacy rate in Madurai. There is a relatively high percentage of literate persons in comparison to the rest of India, although it can be seen that there is quite a great disparity between the number of literate men (991,010) to the number of literate women (785,644) with a difference of more than 205,000. Although this wide gap in the literacy rate of men compared to women can be the result of several underlying factors, it can be hypothesized that the primary contribution to this inequality is the social boundaries associated with educating women.