A tiny village in Punjab’s Bathinda district, which has the fifth lowest sex ratio in the state, has started empowering women by displaying their names prominently outside their houses.
Himmatpura village, home to just 350 people, has reversed the state-wide trend of displaying names of male members outside homes and instead has prominently put up names of women in front of each house along with their mobile numbers and a slogan about social awakening.
Himmatpura may be the first village in Punjab to honour women in such a unique manner, but the practice was started in Haryana’s Bibipur village in July 2015. According to Punjab health department data for 2016-17, the Bathinda district’s sex ratio is 888.
Himmatpura is home to small and marginal farmers with landholdings between nearly 4 and 20 acres.
A woman heads the six-member panchayat that has two more female members. Interestingly, 55% of the villagers are women.
The village gram sabha decided to prominently display the names of all women outside their homes a fortnight ago.
Woman sarpanch ensured men backed changes
Its effort got a boost from a panchayat member, Roop Singh, who contributed Rs 10,000 to prepare 62 nameplates — one for each house in the village. The panchayat has created a corpus fund for females — it will start giving shagun of Rs 5,100 on marriage to all female villagers and Rs 1,100 on the birth of a girlchild in the village from this Lohri. Apart from this scheme, local girls excelling in any field, especially education or sports will also be honoured from Saturday.
