Minister strongly contradicts Unicef report

FE Report State minister for women and children affairs Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury Tuesday strongly contradicted a United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) report which claimed five million women were missing in the country. She also rejected the claims of the UN body which said there are bonded labour and sex related abortions in the country. "There are no missing women in the country. Rather, the term should be invisible women," said Shirin. "There is no sex related abortions in Bangladesh. Also there is no bonded or pseudo labour, rather they are domestic workers," Shirin added. The report titled 'A Perspective on Gender Equality in Bangladesh, From Young Girl to Adolescent: What is Lost in Transition?', was launched at a programme at a city hotel. An analysis based on selected results of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) 2009, the report was unveiled by Shirin Sharmin. "Using Amartya Sen's female to male ratio comparison method, we find that in Bangladesh the sex ratio in the overall population is 105 men for every 100 women instead of the norm of 95 men for every 100 women. Based on this calculation, over 5.0 million women are missing in Bangladesh," said the report. "Seeking to identify where these 'missing' females are, an analysis in MICS shows a low number of girls aged 15-19 years old, another clue is the sex ratio of people aged above 65 years, which is 70 females per 100 males. This is contrary to the norm," it further explained.