Marking International Women’s Day, the Church in Madhya Pradesh state has launched two initiatives to help women access government schemes and assert their rights.

The Sisters of Jesus and Sagar diocese organized more than 250 women for a rally in Rehli town to create awareness of gender discrimination on March 7, marking Women’s Day.

The culmination of the rally at the town’s market included a play staged for some 2,000 people gathered there for their weekly shopping. The play stressed the need for girls’ education and showed how moneylenders cheat illiterate people.

“Gender discrimination is the root cause of the backwardness of women in our society,” said Sister Anila Chacko after the rally. The nun, a medical nurse, said that mothers often hesitate to breastfeed baby girls as they prefer boys.

Girls are also discriminated against with regard to food, education and their choice of a life partner, said Sister Mereena Antony.

In another Church initiative, Madhya Pradesh Isai Maha Sangh, the federation of lay Christian organizations in the state, observed the special day with a day-long program on how to access state welfare schemes meant for women.

“Our women are totally unaware of the government welfare and employment programs meant for them,” said Sheela Santiago, a Christian woman, an organizer of the program in Bhopal, the state capital.

Anil Mittal, finance manager of the state’s Backward Classes and Minorities Finance Development Corporation, who led the classes, said schemes are available to give low interest loans to women for self-employment, education and to start small businesses.

But they “seldom make use of such schemes,” Mittal said.

Suhasini Das, one of some 300 people at the program, said the Church should help educate the poor about such schemes. She wanted parish priests to announce such schemes and Church media to publicize them. Most schemes would “immensely help” the poor Christians in the villages, she said.