I personally view the contribution of women to the progress of mankind needs to be high- lighted, praised and encouraged. It is natural to me that women are co-workers together with their “male” companions on equal footing to toil for the progress and development of the common good of humanity. Unfortunately, the culture and history seemed to have treated the female gender as the second fiddle to the master masculine. Playing the role of the bearer of the future, that is the children of the future, is no second role to me.

As much as nature has provided that procreation is only possible at the meeting of male and female essence, we have no reason to judge that one gender is superior to the other. Whilst it may well be true that in the prehistoric time of the “homosapiens”, men were endowed with large muscles to hunt and gather food for the family whilst the female partner was equipped with the qualities required to look after the children. Does this physical force yield supremacy to the male gender? I doubt it

Looking after the family and bearing children during a lengthy pregnancy, and the post pregnancy time of breastfeeding period may temporarily restrict the woman’s freedom of movements. She is, as a matter of fact during her confinement, very nobly assuring humanity of its future. There again, does the apparent mobility enjoyed by the man during that time, make the male superior?

By social convention, in a large majority of traditions through the ages, men were conferred the title “head of the household”, synonymous of the authority.Is being the head of the family a privilege, or an obligation or a responsibility?

That being the case, it has become somewhat more difficult to establish back the equal footing perspective. Although in some traditions, matriarchal societies have emerged with varying degrees of authority or supremacy.

In India, for centuries, some societies are totally matriarchal. . You must have read of some tribes of the Amazon region totally governed by women.

Now that we have long passed the need of physical strength superiority, let us make restitution of the equality of the genders.

To change the much anchored traditions of the supremacy of the male gender will definitely take time as the structures established through the ages have been constructed with the concept that man is superior by right.

I am all for the celebrations of similar “International Women’s day”, to establish back the contribution of each gender and would even venture to apply positive discrimination for the female gender to help fastening the process in some instances.