Paper short abstract:

Empowerment of women means equiping women to be economically independent and personally self-reliant,with a positive self esteem to enable them to face any difficult situation.Empowering women leads to certain socio- cultural changes in daily life.

Paper long abstract:

Empowerment is a multi-faceted, multi-dimentional and multi--layered concept,which should enable the individuals or a group of individuals to realise their full identity and power in all spheres of life. Empowerment is a complex term which may be measured in terms of women's freedom to shape their lives,their control over resources and their access to basic facilities,their level of political participation,their ability to take their own decision and to remove hinderances in their path to progress.In recent years empowerment of women has been recognised a central issue in determining the status of women.Education is a milestone of women empowerment because it enables them to respond to the challenges,to confront their traditional role and change their life.Besides economic independence of women will also create social changes.

Though it is perceived that the status of a woman is enhanced by empowerment it is not yet explained how it empowers women in the family set-up.The power relations in a family are a very important aspect from the point of view of empowerment of woman.An employed woman may be very powerful and efficient in an organisation but the situation at home may be different.The empowerment achieved through employment is analysed through eight elements of empowerment e.g.self-esteem,importance in the family,role in deciding the number of children,decision making in family matters,role of employment in keeping up individuality,increase in self-dependence,family income and in securing the respect of husband and in-laws.

In our study we would compare the role of empowered women and house-wives in their family life.