With a spirit of collective resolve, a four-day session on engaging men and boys to ensure gender equality kickstarted in the Capital on Monday. The four-day symposium will dwell upon a host of issues ranging from gender violence to glaring disparities between genders.
“In the last one year, men and women, boys and girls from a cross-section of society — from auto drivers and students to those living in clusters and far flung colonies — have come together not only to provide solidarity but to initiate a search for alternatives, deeper inner transformation within themselves and the people around,” added Amitabh Behar, executive director, National Foundation for India (NFI).
Actor and activist Rahul Bose said, “Both men and women should shed all burdens of patriarchy and practice a new masculinity, which will enable men to walk with women in the quest for a more peaceful, more meaningful existence.” “The time has come for a more caring male persona to assert itself and for a global movement to emerge, which will mainstream men’s role in gender issues through specific planning and policy initiatives,” said Abhijit Das, director, Centre for Health and Social Justice.
The symposium will provide a roadmap for governments, UN agencies and all other institutions and organisations on men’s role in ensuring gender equality. It comes five years after the First Global Symposium, which was held in Rio de Janeiro in 2009.