Five city women—a doctor, two government officers and two businesswomen—have started a pan-India car drive to promote ‘save the girl child’ campaign.
Last year’s Census report had painted grim picture for the girl child in Maharashtra. The dismal sex ratio of 883 girls per 1,000 boys has left the state government, NGOs and demographers worried.
But these five city women have perhaps saved their anger and energy to do something different to create awareness among families across India and also get them to prove the women power and make a record as well.
The all-women team has kicked off the pan-India car drive on Monday from the CST station. Boarding in an Innova car, which has bundles of pamphlets supporting the girl child, the team comprises five middle aged women—Rohana Shetty (50), Puja Hatkar (49) both working as superintendent in the Customs at Mumbai, Dr Anita Suchak (60), a gynaecologist from Malad, Indrayani Kandpile (47), an HP gas dealer from Uran and Sneha Butala (47) from Mahad who has her own real estate business.
“We wanted to do our bit to stop female foeticide and to make people aware about the power of women. We want to show everyone that daughters are not the burden, but are precious gift of God. They can do anything in the world which a boy can do, if you want them to be alive,” Puja Hatkar told DNA.
“The car drive idea suited us as all of us are drivers. We hope our drive makes some difference,” said Puja. The women headed towards Ahmedabad. From there they will go to Delhi, Chandigarh, Agra and Allahabad. “We will go to Aurangabad (Bihar) and Kolkata and from there our destination would be Karnataka-probably Davangere district,” she said.
They will be driving the car one by one on route, mostly in the daytime. Rohana said, “We hope to cover 6,000km in 15 days. This would be a Limca record also.” To sustain the energy, they have decides to eat less. “Eating less will help all of us. But we will definitely tasting food of all the states in moderation.”
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