Educating Girls Is A Success Key To Development

New Delhi: "Educating Girls is a secret key for Development". Do you believe in it? Well, here's how Mr. Shashi Tharoor, Union Minister of State for Human Resource Development (HRD) briefs out the issue. Read on...

On stressing that one in every three women in the country was illiterate even today, he said If you educate a girl, you educate an entire community. "If I had to pick the one thing we must do above all else, I now offer a two-word mantra i.e. 'Educate Girls'.

He spoke here on Wednesday, while delivering the 18th Justice Sunanda Bhandare Memorial Lecture at the India International Centre.

He said "Scholarly studies and research projects have established what common sense might have already have told us: that 'if you educate a boy, you educate a person, but if you educate a girl, you educate a family' and benefit an entire community".

He also noted that, "It is a matter of deep national concern that even today nearly one out of every three women in our country is illiterate" and also commented on the challenges facing the government n educating girl children. "Our experience suggests that while at the primary level the enrollment rates for girls and boys are roughly identical, sustaining the girl child through the education system remains a challenge", he added.

He further summarized the importance of women education as "All our claims to be the world's largest democracy will ring hollow in the face of president gender discrimination with regard to access to education and in particular to top quality education. The continuing difference between our enrollment ratio for boys and girls at most levels of our education system is a national shame".

Well, will this development reduce the gender gap in India, is yet to be seen. What do you think? How important is Women education according to you and Why?