Women-led progress a key G20 agenda for India: Irani

India has changed the decades-old perception that women need to be emancipated as the county has gone a step further and made them equal participants in the development journey, says Union minister Smriti Irani

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi has ensured that women-led development has taken centre stage with regard to India's G20 presidency while stressing that women become equal partners in the country's development story, Union women and child development minister Smriti Irani said on Monday.

Irani was addressing a Hindustan Times event on "Women-led development", part of a series of events HT is hosting on India's G20 agenda.

"You would be a bit flummoxed that women-led development as an agenda is yet to find a home at the UN. Because for decades now, it has been perceived that women need to be emancipated; that we need to be at the receiving end of tools. We are those who are subjugated and need governments across the world to always rescue us," Irani said.

"However, we should give credit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi who has ensured that women-led development remains centre stage with regard to India's G20 presidency. For the first time, we have a head of the government who says we want to ensure women are equal partners in India's development journey because we women can rescue parts of our economy when given leadership roles," she said. "I think that the tectonic shift as to how women are to be perceived within democracies and economies is a big contribution already."

The time has come to recognise women are not victims, the Union minister said. "We are sources of empowerment in every segment of society. So I think that is a very big change that has already happened in terms of the G20 narrative and agenda," she said.