Himalayan News Service

Lalitpur, March 3:

A 25-day training to prepare women for the post of gazetted, third class officers (non-technical) examination, in Public Service Commission (PSC) started here today. The training is being given to 80 women who have passed the PSC’s preliminary examination held in 2004.

The training is organised by Maintstreaming Gernder Equity Programme (MGEP) which is jointly supported by the United Nations Development Programme and the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare (MoWCS) and the USAID. According to the PSC data, women’s participation in public service is 9.54 per cent and 1.22 per cent of them are first class gazetted officers. The PSC’s research in 1998 showed necessity of quota system to increase women’s participation in public service.

Indu Pant Ghimire, national programme manager, said there has been a gradual improvement in women’s status in various sectors but there was room for improvement.

“There is a need to revise the existing structure of administration and amend laws to make the policy inclusive for the implementation and commitment to women’s participation,” she said. Minister of Tourism, Culture and Civil Aviation, Buddhi Raj Bajracharya, while inaugurating the programme, said the government is committed to bring an all inclusive policy for the greater participation of women in public service. Shree Dhar Pokherel, acting secretary of MoWCS said, “The society will benefit from women’s empowerment and men should not feel threatened. This is good opportunity to increase women’s participation and uplift the society.”

Madhav Prasad Ghimire, secretary of Ministry of General Administration said, “To bring in the higher participation of women at the policy and decision-making level, the government is committed to improving the situation through positive discrimination.” He added that to maintain meritocracy in public service, various aspects need to be balanced. Therefore, challenge is ahead of everyone to maintain the standard of meritocracy as well.