The speakers also underscored the need of changing social attitude in this regard and said women's empowerment will not be established in a day.

CARE Bangladesh held the discussion titled 'Empowerment of Women' at Osmani Memorial Hall on the occasion of its two-day 'Shouhardo Dibosh' with the slogan 'Building alliances for development' that concluded yesterday.

UM Habibun Nessa of Save the Children UK spoke on 'Instilling a vision of equality in future generation to stop violence against women' while Maheen Sultan of Naripakkha and Faustina Pereira of Ain O Salish Kendra spoke on 'Building social movements to reduce violence against women' and 'Improving agency of women for zero tolerance to domestic violence' respectively. Director of Democracywatch Taherunnesa Abdullah chaired the discussion.

"Since domestic violence is not recognised by the society and state, no distinct steps have yet been taken although the rate is alarming," said Taherunnesa.

Highlighting the draft policy to resist domestic violence, Faustina Pereira said comprehensive mechanism is a must to make it effective. At the same time, domestic violence should be linked up with the national cost to find out its severity, she added.

Although much advancement has taken place regarding issues on women rights in the last two or three decades, society's attitude towards women has not changed much, they said adding that even rape victims are still stigmatised in the society.

They called for a social movement to resist violence against women, as it is one of the major obstacles to establish equity between men and women.