Nanhi Chhaan

The Nanhi Chhaan Foundation, a not-for-profit organization aims at generating an understanding of the issues of an inverse gender ratio and depleting tree cover, as a part of the global arena of women's and environmental issues. The Nanhi Chhaan Foundation seeks to use the strength and adaptability of human faith – religious, spiritual, or rational – to invoke interest and concern about these problems

[nanhichhaan]

Data indicates poor enforcement of law to check female foeticide

Data indicates poor enforcement of law to check female foeticide

Only 143 persons have been convicted till date under PC&PNDT Act that bans sex determination test

While the child sex ratio in the country is dipping, not much seems to have been done to check sex determination tests and selective abortions. Data for the whole country shows only 143 people have been punished for conducting sex determination tests since the enactment of the Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (PC&PNDT) Act in 1996. This number was disclosed by Union health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad in a written reply submitted to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

The state that has punished maximum number of offenders under the Act is  Maharashtra with 52 convictions, followed by Haryana (30), Punjab (26) and Rajasthan (22). States like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Uttarakhand have not punished a single person till date. Gujarat has convicted only four persons. These are the poor performing states as far as maintaining healthy sex ratio is concerned.

According to Census 2011, the Child Sex Ratio (0-6 years) has declined to 919 girls per 1,000 boys against 927 girls per 1,000 boys recorded in the 2001 Census. This indicates prevalence of pre-natal sex determination and consequent abortion of female foetuses, the minister said. Apart from conviction, other actions taken against violators also do not reflect commitment on part of authorities to bring offenders to book.

A total of 1,833 cases have been registered so far across the country, including Rajasthan (562), Maharashtra (527), Punjab (124), Gujarat (114), Haryana (90) and Uttar Pradesh (42) under the Act.

The number of medical licences of doctors cancelled till date stands at 65 for the whole country. The maximum number of such cancellations have taken place in Maharashtra (37), followed by Rajasthan which has cancelled 21 licences so far.

Maharashtra has seized total 662 ultrasound machine machines (unregistered/used for illegal sex determination tests) while Rajasthan has seized 371 machines so far. A total 1,242 machines have been seized across the country, informed the Union health minister.

The government of India, in order to make the law more stringent, has amended various provisions of PC&PNDT Rules. These pertain to sealing, seizure and confiscation of unregistered ultra-sound machines and punishment for unregistered clinics, regulation of use of portable ultrasound machine only within the registered premises besides restricting medical practitioners from conducting ultrasonography at maximum of two ultrasound clinics within a district.

The government has been exhorting states and Union Territories to strictly implement PC&PNDT Act, the minister said.

[nanhichhaan]

Tribals have tradition of gender equality, society can take lessons from them: Pranab

Speaking as a chief guest at the golden jubilee function of the Tribal Research and Training Institute (TRTI), President Pranab Mukherjee said on Saturday that there is a lot for the Indian society to learn from the tribals — especially about how to treat women. He said that at a time when crimes against women are making news, the tribal traditions put forth example of chivalry worth of emulation.

"Presently, there is an increasing concern in the country about women's safety as well as general moral decadence in the society. A peek into gender behaviour and relation tribal communities hold a significant society at large. At such a time we should try and learn from out tribal brothers. They have a long tradition of gender equality and treating women with respect," said the president at the function held at Balgandharva Auditorium.

Mukherjee said that while some of the objectives of the tribal policy were achieved in last sixty years of independence, lot remained to be done for empowerment of the tribals and their inclusion into the main stream.

"The tribal development policy of the country was envisaged by the first prime minister of the country Jawaharlal Nehru. Leaders of freedom struggle had understood the importance of inclusion of each and every segment of the Indian society in the movement of independence including the tribals. Empowerment of the tribals was one of the 18-point formula for development of the country devised by the father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi. In last sixty years we have progressed on this path, however much remains to be done. A multipronged strategy needs to be adopted so that the schemes which are devised for the tribals actually benefit them," said Mukherjee.

Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar during the event said that, while the tribal tradition in India was rich, they had remained backward in many aspects while India as general has progressed.

Read in detail at : http://nanhichhaan.blogspot.in/2013/12/tribals-have-tradition-of-gender.html

[nanhichhaan]

India's Cradle Baby scheme hopes to end female infanticide

Unwanted infant girls in the sterile, sparsely furnished nursery rooms of the Life Line Trust orphanage in Tamil Nadu state, southern India, are considered the lucky ones. They are India's "Cradle Babies" - products of a government project that permits parents to give unwanted baby girls anonymously to the state, saving them from possible death in a region where daughters are seen as a burden and where their murder is a common reality. "Often babies are found in ditches and garbage pits. Some are alive, others are dead," said A. Devaki, a government child protection officer in the Salem district, one of the worst-afflicted areas. "Just last week, we found a newborn baby girl barely breathing in a dustbin at the local bus stand." She added that a lack of education, the low status of girls and widespread poverty were the main factors why girl babies were killed or dumped with little chance of survival. "One girl is okay, but a second or third will likely end up being killed. That's why we introduced the Cradle Baby Scheme." But while the project has been praised for potentially saving the lives of thousands of Indian girls, human rights activists have criticised it, accusing authorities of encouraging the abandonment of girls and promoting the low status of women in this largely patriarchal society. Started in 1992, the project runs in dusty towns and mud-and-brick villages across Tamil Nadu. It allows parents to leave unwanted baby girls in dozens of empty cradles in hospitals, welfare centers and government offices. At the beginning, parents would secretly leave their babies in the cribs. These days, they are more open and simply hand infants to welfare officers. The children are then sent to registered orphanages like the Life Line Trust where they are put up for adoption. "Words can't explain how much joy this little girl gives us," said R. Umamangeshwari, 42, sitting next to her husband, a businessman in the textile industry, with their newly adopted one-year-old daughter, Janani. After 10 years of trying for a child, the couple approached the orphanage and within a year, after government welfare officers carried out checks, they were deemed suitable adoptive parents and given custody of Janani. Since the Cradle Baby programme began, poverty-stricken parents and single mothers have handed-in over 3,700 children, mostly girls. More than 3,600 of them have been adopted by childless, middle-class couples in Tamil Nadu, officials said. Palaniamma, 40, recalled how her mother took away her newborn daughter and put her in the scheme 11 years ago. Days later, she convinced her family to get her daughter back. "I am glad I refused to give her up," Palaniamma said outside her mud-and-thatch home in Krishnapuram village. "Whatever difficulties I'll face, I thought, it's better to bring up my own child than desert her." Activists and officials say financial pressures associated with dowries are so great that parents have been aborting female fetuses for decades after discovering their gender through ultrasound examinations, despite the practice being illegal. A 2011 study in The Lancet medical journal found up to 12 million Indian girls had been aborted in the past three decades. Other parents kill girls or fail to save them from preventable diseases, leading to alarmingly skewed child gender ratios. There were 919 girls to every 1,000 boys in 2011 compared with 976 in 1961, says the Census of India. In Salem, communities like the Vanniyar people practice infanticide more than feticide, often because they cannot afford ultrasound tests, which are growing in popularity in parts of India, to illegally determine the unborn child's sex. There are no official figures on how many girls have been killed across the state, but government officials and activists say at least one or two cases of babies being abandoned or found dead are reported every month. In June, local media reported the arrest of a father of four girls in the district of Dharmapuri. He was suspected of killing his 22-day-old daughter by feeding her poisoned milk, then burying her corpse in a ditch. Officials say the Cradle Baby programme has been a success, improving gender ratios where the project is active. Rights activists say the improved ratio is largely a result of greater awareness and advocacy work, and better family planning, rather than because of the project. They say the programme has failed to tackle the root causes of female infanticide by promoting the abandonment of girls and allowing parents to shift responsibility to the state. As a result, they say, killing of baby girls continues. "The government is legitimising the dumping of girls," said M. Shankar of the Development Education and Environment Protection Society, a Dharmapuri-based charity that works on gender rights issues.

[nanhichhaan]

'India among the worst in man-woman equality'

India may be the world's second fastest growing economy, but it figures among the worst when it comes to man-woman equality - at 114th among 134 countries, on the World Economic Forum (WEF) rankings. Worse, sharing Nobel laureate Amartya Sen's concern over female foeticide and 25 million 'missing women' in India, the WEF has placed the country at the bottom of the table on health and survival issues, reflecting the huge gender gap. The India Gender Gap Review 2009, released at the India Economic Summit in New Delhi on Monday, ranked the country behind Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal - showing that women in these countries share resources with men more equally than in India. The Geneva-based international organisation, known for its global conferences and studies, has made strong remarks against the wide inequalities between the health facilities extended to males and females. "We find that there are still persistent gaps in health and survival, a fact that contributes to India's 'missing' women," it said. It said close to 300 Indian women die every day during childbirth or of pregnancy-related causes, and the country has the worst sex ratios at birth in the world, ranking 131st on this variable. However, India's performance in empowering women politically, relative to the rest of the work, is strong, ranking at the 24th position. Women hold 11 per cent of the positions in Parliament and 10 per cent ministerial-level positions.

Read in detail at : http://nanhichhaan.blogspot.in/2013/11/india-among-worst-in-man-woman-equality.html

[nanhichhaan]

Leadership gender gap in India

In its innovative research series, ‘Advancing Women in India’, Catalyst provides an insightful profile of the challenges corporate India faces regarding the optimisation of its female talent.

It also recommends action steps for developing and advancing women in this crucial emerging market. The first report - Leadership Gender Gap in India Inc: Myths and Realities - focuses on building awareness, looking primarily at differences/similarities in workplace perceptions and experiences for women and men leaders working in multinational companies in India. Data used in the analyses come from the project on global leaders that Catalyst conducted in 2006-2008 with the Families and Work Institute, and from The Promise of Future Leadership: A Research Program on Highly Talented Employees in the Pipeline, conducted across 2007 - 2010.  In India, with a gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate of approximately 7 per cent, and a projected talent gap, or a shortage of skilled labour to sustain this growth, of more than 5 million by 2012, it is alarming that India Inc continues to underutilise its female talent pool. India’s long-term economic health depends significantly on investment in and utilisation of female talent. Bringing women into the workplace is half the answer.  Creating an inclusive workplace - where all talent can thrive - is the answer. However, scaling the corporate ladder in India Inc continues to be an arduous task for women. Although women’s workforce participation has grown significantly (and faster than men in recent years), women represent only 36 per cent of the labour force-less than half that of men (85 per cent).

It is not about differences in work values and aspirations, but barriers to career advancement faced by women in India. We often hear that the reason women don’t advance as far in business or are more apt to leave workplaces is because they have different work values and goals.  We are also often told that women don’t aspire to leadership roles. Our data suggests otherwise. We found that men and women leaders had similar work place values and goals. Our analysis also draws attention to the fact that 97.2 per cent women and 95.6 per cent men aspired to a job with higher responsibility.  However, 70.4 per cent women and 54.6 per cent men reported downsizing their aspirations during their career thus far. Evidently, women encountered barriers to career advancement, including lack of role models, more than their male counterparts. Although women and men have similar aspirations vis-a-vis advancement, there are differences in what and who women know in the workplace, and that impacts their development and advancement.  We also found that men leaders were relatively more proactive in pursuing a job opening in the company if it interested them (24.3 per cent women compared to 40.4 per cent men).  Another myth in the workplace is around flexibility; that it is about accommodating the needs of a few employees, mostly women. Catalyst expertise suggests that work-life effectiveness is a mutually beneficial partnership between businesses and their employees (including both women and men). We found that leaders in India and Europe were relatively more likely to put job before family compared to their counterparts in the United States-67.8 per cent in India, 62 per cent in the United States, and 66.9 per cent in Europe.  Culling from decades of Catalyst expertise and recommendations from women and men leaders in business in India, a few considerations and questions to ask as organisations approach and improve their gender leadership gap: 

Read the detailed article at : http://nanhichhaan.blogspot.in/2013/11/leadership-gender-gap-in-india.html

[nanhichhaan]

Women Are Working, But Who’s Counting

Most women in our lives would be working long hours without rest and our homes would be dysfunctional without them. However, neither is their contribution nominally measured nor is there sufficient, if any, recompense for their efforts. 

By Harpal Singh

  THE inadequate recognition and decided disadvantage that girls and women experience in the economic life of our country is staggering. In no other instance would the imbalance between contribution and benefits be as sharply mismatched as with the female gender in India. Girls and women neither enjoy economic power nor adequate voice, a fact that is embarrassing in its magnitude. Why is this so? As Alice Walker once argued, “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” Clearly the female voice needs to be heard louder and with greater import.

Unquestionably, the time has come to change the equation and to restore some balance, even more so when contributions to the GDP in the future are much more likely to come from knowledge power rather than physical superiority. In making the shift all means need to be adopted from changing laws to changing social and cultural norms that suppress (if not suffocate) the voice of girls and women. New platforms of the “Nanhi Chhaan” variety need to be promoted to accelerate the pace of change. Loud and effective advocacy combined with actions on the ground is the need of the hour. Let’s examine a little more about today’s reality.One would be hard-pressed to find any other strata of society anywhere on earth whose recognition and contribution to society is wholly at odds with their presence in it. Indian women make up nearly 48 per cent of the Indian population (7.5 per cent of the global population, or 614 million in actual number) but India ranks 113 out of the universe of 135 countries in the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index.

While overall there is some progress (significant only if one accounts for a low starting point) on many major social indicators for women — mortality rates, literacy rates, access to sanitation, food and healthcare — there remain significant questions on their economic impact in society, especially in a country where girls and women are often seen by their own families as an economic burden. Intriguingly this is at considerable odds with the great Indian family tradition. After all, women are the edifice around which Indian families are usually built. Most women in our lives would be working long hours without rest and our homes would be dysfunctional without them. However, neither is their contribution nominally measured nor is there sufficient, if any, recompense for their efforts.

The UNDP Human Development Report says that while 67 per cent of the world’s work is done by woman, merely 10 per cent of global income is earned by women and only 1 per cent of the property in the world is owned by women. One may not be wrong in saying that the position is even worse when it comes to calculating our very own Indian GDP. Women may work hard behind the scenes to maintain the house and children so that the husband may concentrate on his job and earn money but since there is no monetary value ascertained for her work, it has no bearing on the computation of the GDP. Ironically, if two neighbouring women were to work at each other’s homes and be paid identically, our GDP value would appreciate dramatically! Quite apart from earning an income, the fact that their contributions would be valued will have a salutary effect on their status as also on the seriousness with which their voices are heard. In the same spirit, to do honour to girls, Nanhi Chhaan invokes all citizens to plant a sapling for the women in their lives. Through such simple yet emotive acts the agenda for the uplift of women will gain momentum as it enters the home of every Indian family.

  A recent report by Booz & Company, a consultancy, stated that if female labour participation rates in India were to match those for men, the Indian GDP would resultantly increase by more than 20 per cent by 2020. A similar study by the Evangelical Social Action Forum valued the unpaid household work performed by women throughout India as upwards of $ 612.8 bn — more than a third of our current GDP! A good starting point could be that in computing household income one-third of the total household income of all Indian households is ascribed and credited to the account of the homemaker, a majority of who are women. By recognising her contribution and crediting her account, society will harvest innumerable benefits on issues like education, health, hygiene and nutrition with all the attendant multiplier effects.

  The need of the hour is to educate and create awareness about the extent of the economic contribution of women to our society and to do so on an ongoing basis. While everyone realises that what women do is important, very few realise the amount of their contribution. And this change would have to start from women themselves. After all no one realises your value if you don’t. Can the ‘Nanhi’ please stand up.

    — The writer is chairman of the Nanhi Chhaan Foundation and Save the Children, India

[nanhichhaan]

GENDER EQUALITY: Why involving men is crucial

Photo: Nancy Palus/IRIN

Gender equality cannot be achieved unless men and boys are convinced of the importance of equal opportunities for women and girls

NAIROBI/KAMPALA, 3 October 2011 (IRIN) - The involvement of men is key to the success of the gender-equality movement, but changing long-held social structures and convincing men of the importance of equal opportunities for women will not happen overnight, experts say. "Men giving up their superior position is akin to acting out of the normative or prescribed way and [means men can be] ridiculed for acting differently - not like men," Maria Magezi, programme officer with the NGO, Akina Mama wa Afrika, told IRIN in the Ugandan capital, Kampala. "This also means that men will feel as if some kind of power is being taken away from them and the normal thing is to fight to restore their position and power." A new report by the NGO, Plan International, says gender equality cannot be achieved unless men and boys are convinced of the importance of equal opportunities for women and girls. "Policies alone can't do it - we need to start looking for ways to engage boys and men so that they start to see the value in equal opportunities for girls," said Edith Wanjohi, gender advisor for Plan's regional office in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi. According to Plan, when it comes to gender equality, men generally fall into three categories: those who acknowledge that women and girls deserve equal rights but fear that boys will lose out if girls are allowed to enjoy these rights; those who do not believe in equal rights - the largest group; and those who believe in equality and put these beliefs into action - the smallest group. A Plan survey of more than 4,000 adolescent children in India, Rwanda and the United Kingdom found that boys were often conditioned to have negative attitudes towards women. Some 65 percent of respondents from Rwanda and India totally or partially agreed with the statement that "a woman should tolerate violence in order to keep her family together". More than 60 percent of children interviewed in India agreed that "if resources are scarce it is better to educate a boy instead of a girl". Include men in programming "The cost of not working with boys and young men is that programmes and policies [working] with young women and girls will continue to come up against the barrier of male power and expectations, structures and beliefs that benefit men over women," the authors state. "The price that will be paid is simple: the continuing disempowerment of girls and young women down the generations – and the restriction of boys and young men to traditional 'male' roles." As a result of the women-centred approach of gender programmes over the years, men have largely been sidelined in the discussion and have often felt alienated by the sometimes confrontational approach taken by gender activism. If a boy sees his father treating his sisters and mother with respect, he will pick up on it; if he sees his father beating his mother up, there's a much higher chance that he too will be abusive"At international gender meetings - from Beijing to the UN - the vast majority of participants are women... we are preaching to the converted; not involving those who have the power to change things means you can't achieve the change you want," said Gezahegn Kebede, Plan's regional director. Plan recommends involving men in the policy-making, implementation and activism around gender equality. "Though gender equality is being pushed for, to an extent there has been failure by the implementers or advocates of gender equality to actually transform the institutions where this happens, which means that work is being done on the surface in the name of gender equality but in actual sense the root causes - such as patriarchy - are not being tackled, which makes the struggle unfruitful and has led to many projects... to being women-only projects," said Akina Mama Wa Afrika's Magezi. Plan's report notes that by excluding men from the gender agenda, young boys also feel alienated by the gender message; the report quotes a research project led by the Institute of Education in London, which quoted an example of a participant of the Girls Education Movement in South Africa, who "was working with school kids from 15 to 19 years and talking about the girl child. There was booing from the boys." Back to basics Real change must start at home. "If a boy sees his father treating his sisters and mother with respect, he will pick up on it; if he sees his father beating his mother up, there's a much higher chance that he too will be abusive," said Wanjohi. She noted that schools, religious institutions and other key areas of society must also be involved in ensuring men and boys understand their role in improving the lives of women. "Despite the positive developments towards attitudes regarding girls' education, gender roles back at home that put too much pressure on the girls makes the whole environment unfavourable to girls," Celestine Magero, a teacher at a Nairobi school, told IRIN. "When a girl gets back home, she has to do house chores before settling down to read. Girls from poor backgrounds miss many school days, for example, during their menstrual cycle, because they can hardly afford sanitary pads." The report found that engaging men in women's rights programmes gave them much-needed momentum; Wanjohi said involving male cultural leaders in Kenya in efforts to end female genital mutilation had had positive effects.  Resistance Changing long-held views will take time, as many men continue to resist change. "The role of a woman in the society is to be a man's helper. That is the way things are supposed to be when you look at it culturally and even from a religious point of view," said Julius Mueni, a Nairobi preacher. "It is not bad to give women opportunities but to say they should be equal to men is an impossible dream." Mueni says given limited resources, his male children would always get priority. And many women still adhere to antiquated notions of gender roles and pass these on to their children. "I train my male children to always act strong because that is what society expects from them and that is what I believe in," said Helen Omamo, a 37-year-old mother of four girls and two boys. "I can't send a boy child to the kitchen yet I have a girl child watching television. "Equally I can't stomach my boy coming home crying that another boy has beaten him - let him retaliate," she added. "My children have learned to accept that. If you train a girl to be abrasive, then you are training somebody who cannot be married." Source : IRIN ( http://www.irinnews.org/report/93870/gender-equality-why-involving-men-is-crucial ) 

[unicef]

Helping the typhoon’s youngest victims

For children caught in the storm’s path, relief cannot come fast enough. UNICEF is racing to help the youngest and often most vulnerable typhoon victims. UNICEF Spokesman Kent Page speaks with CNN’s Anderson Cooper about the United Nations Children’s Fund’s operation in the typhoon zone.

If you can help…please visit: http://uni.cf/haiyan

[nanhichhaan]

Urban India’s male preference still telling in Census data

                                                                                                                                                                    November 5, 2013: 

  Despite boasting better education and living standards, India’s city-dwellers still have a lot to learn from their counterparts living in villages when it comes to respect for the girl child.

The female-male sex ratio in rural areas has been consistently higher than in urban India even decades before Independence, the latest Census data for 2011 shows.

 The sex ratio in rural India has remained consistently above 900 women for every 1,000 men since 1901. But the ratio in urban areas fell from 910 women in 1901 to about 858 on average over the next nine decades. It was only in 2001 that a turnaround was seen, with the ratio returning to 901. In 2011, the ratio was at a century high of 929 women for every 1,000 men.

SETTING AN EXAMPLE

 Kerala continued to set an example for the rest of the country when it comes to the sex ratio, which favours women at 1,084 women for every 1,000 men. Puducherry was another highlight with its ratio of 1,037 women.

Tamil Nadu rounded up the list of the top three States which have positive sex ratios, with 996 women for every 1000 men. South India has done well in general, with Andhra Pradesh also having a fairly balanced ratio of 992 women for 1,000 men.

Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli have the lowest ratio on the list, at 618 and 773 respectively. This is largely because a considerable portion of the population in the two union territories are highly-skilled migrant workers whose families remain in their native States.

But this doesn’t hold true for Chandigarh. The capital of Punjab and Haryana has just 817 women to show for every 1,000 men.

National capital Delhi also has some deep-seated issues with women, it would seem, judging by its poor sex ratio of 867.  The Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim and Punjab are the other laggard States, with less than 900 women for every 1,000 men.

 There are 78.8 million girls in the 0-6 years age group in the country, constituting 47.9 per cent of the population. Another 95.6 million girls are in the 11-18 years age bracket.

According to Census data, of the total women counted in the country in 2011, 42.9 per cent were never married, 48.9 per cent were married and 8.2 per cent were widowed, divorced or separated. The mean marriage age for women stood at 21.2 years. Among the major States, the highest mean age at marriage was 22.6 years in Kerala and the lowest was 20.3 years in West Bengal.

The latest available information shows that out of 162.8 million households in rural areas in 2009-10, 19.2 million (11.8 per cent) were headed by women. In urban areas, the corresponding ratio was 11.6 per cent of the total 68.3 million households.

[nanhichhaan]

Every second Indian child is malnourished: Report

Every second child in India is malnourished; 79% children across the country are anaemic; and the child sex ratio is at the lowest ever with 914 girls for every 1000 boys. These are some of the findings in a report, released by Child Rights and You (CRY), that dwells on the abysmal state of children in the country. 

Every second child in India is malnourished; 79% children across the country are anaemic.

  According to the report, the national dropout rate at the elementary level is 40% despite the enactment of the right to education.  "Children are invisible citizens of this country. We have the largest population of kids in the world and yet there has been no national data to check the nutrition level of children since 2005. We are talking about various laws and policies that are being introduced as rights for children but are they availing the same?" asked Puja Marwaha, CRY CEO, after the report was released.  The report also highlights other problems —11.8% of children in India are engaged in some form of child labour and nearly 45% girls still get married before the age of 18 years. "We had to struggle to get national data on nutrition or child trafficking. Nobody has bothered to find out how and where kids are being sold for various reasons," she said.  Take the case of Maharashtra where almost half of the children under five years are stunted and nearly one-fifth are severely stunted. The child sex ratio in the state stands at 883 girls for every 1000 boys. According to the official estimate by the state education department in July 2012, close to 2.3 lakh children were out of school and this group primarily composed of children with disabilities and other disadvantages. "Even in a cosmopolitan city like Mumbai, the child sex ratio is very skewed," said Marwaha.  On the eve of the Children's Day, CRY launched a nationwide "Vote for Child Rights" campaign. It also unveiled the Child Rights Manifesto that calls for all political parties as well as voters to give top priority to children and commit to improving the plight. "We analysed the manifestos by various political parties during the last elections ... Our campaign calls for the citizens to show zero tolerance to any form of violation of child rights," said Kreeanne Rabadi, Regional Director, CRY.  The NGO has approached political leaders with an appeal to give priority to children's issues in their respective party manifestos.