Empowered women create an empowered society: The elderly women of a village called Shantigrame started a Day Care Centre for small children. They pooled their small savings and rented a small place to start this centre. An NGO working in the village also gave them some financial support. There were a number of young girls in this village who were forced to drop out of school because they had to take care of their younger siblings. When the day care centre was started, the infants and very young children were being left there and the young girls went back to school. The parents of the children gave a small token amount to the elderly women who ran the day-care centre, and this small earning gave them resources to improve their own lives. School drop-out numbers reduced considerably and in the course of one year, life in the village changed. During the next four years, a high school and a junior college were also started in Shantigrama and every girl in the village attended school or college, as the case may be. Do you now see how a few women who were empowered and encouraged to look for means of supporting themselves, also empowered other women and girls in their village.

It is thus necessary to empower women. An empowered woman creates a better home and a better society. If she herself is in bondage, how can she help others? So a woman must have the strength and support to lead her life in a free and just atmosphere.