VISAKHAPATNAM : In an effort to provide free legal aid and counselling to the school and college students, the ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padao’ cell was opened in the Durgabai Deshmukh Centre for Women’s Studies of Andhra University here on Saturday.
A social campaign, the Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP) initiative was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 22, 2015 which aims at the survival, protection and education of the girl child.
After inaugurating the cell, vice-chancellor G Nageswara Rao, the Chief guest on the occasion, said, “Although the sex ratio has improved (945:1000), there are regular reports of female infanticide all over India.
Hence the need is to spread awareness and encourage the parents to save the girl child and utilise the support of the government through scholarships and other welfare programmes for girls.” Expressing that girls are more competent than boys, the V-C added, “The ratio of girls to boys in Andhra University is 55:45.”
While the cell will be used to organise seminars, workshops and add on courses to create awareness amongst girls, it will also be used for vocational training and development programmes for the women who are in search of livelihood or are single parent.
Rahimunnisa Begum, the co-convener of BBBP, Andhra Pradesh, while delivering a talk, said, “The need of the hour is to educate the people to curb female infanticide and save the girl child to improve the sex ratio.” By spreading the message, the target is to reach the child labourers, children who are into prostitution and bring them out of these social evils.
“We are working on the social media to create web sites to enable people to file online petitions,” she said. As many as 70 girl students from AU English medium school and Aditya College were a part of the programme.