AHMEDPUR EAST - A three-day training workshop for women to teach them basic journalism and to education about their rights has concluded in Mubarakpur Town.
The workshop was organised by the Rural Media Network Pakistan in collaboration with Unesco at NGO Ever Green’s central office. It was attended by fifteen female members of the education department, NGOs and household women while Ms Shazia Mazhar acted as coordinator.
The purpose of the training workshop was capacity building of deprived women of the rural area. The resource persons
Multan District Information Officer Nasir Hameed, Bahawalur District Information Officer Nouman Masood Khan, RMNP coordinator for ladies Najamun Nisa Bukhari, Professor Shehzad Ahmed Khan, Quratul Ain, Mazhar Rasheed and RMNP President Ehsan Ahmed Sehar taught them basic principles of journalistic writing and ways to enhance their capacity to write and report in a professional way.
The resource persons Nasir Hameed and Nouman Masood Khan delivered lectures on ‘Feature & Article Writing.  The female participants took keen interest in the training and tried their best to polish their skills. The resource persons told the participants that article writing skill is important for women.
They further said that material for these articles was easily available. Unlike literary writing like poetry, short story, the article writing was easy to learn. The trainers put their efforts to aware the participants about hidden violence against women and their rights.
They focused to sensitise them about their rights in the society and inculcate the capability how to report the hidden violence through media and other government & non-governmental agencies .The participants were provided with journalistic training manual and other allied material for their future concern .After that a question-answer session a practical exercise of article writing were held.
RMNP President Ehsan Ahmed Sehar highlighted the issues of violence against women and stressed the need to address them. He said a woman is a great gift of God in the shape of a mother, a sister, a wife and a daughter. He urged women to promote better patience in them to reduce the incidents of domestic violence. He opined that not only men, but women were also involved in violence incidents against women.
“Islam also teaches us equality among men and women. The reasons behind violence against women in our society are lack of education and unawareness about their rights. In foreign countries, the reason behind low number of violence incidents include the women are educated and know about their rights,” he added.

Guest of honour Dr Syeda Ujala Suhail in her speech lauded the role of Unesco and RMNP for organising the training programme for women. She stated that rural societies in Pakistan were highly segregated; lack of women means that the media does not properly cover a large segment of rural life. She hoped that beneficiaries of this training programme would highlight the women’s issues in regional and national media in near future. Later on she distributed certificates among 15 participants.