UNSC Resolution 1325: Women and Conflict: From a South Asia Perspective

South Asian region shares a rich culture and reflects multiculturalism, intermingling of various religions and ethnicities. At the same time in the past half century we have witnessed many conflicts. These conflicts have been ethnic, communal, linguistic, development related, fight for a representative government, border disputes, intra-state, inter state and inter-caste. The most persistent of these have been armed struggle for self determination by the LTTE in Sri Lanka & by separatist groups in Kashmir, Struggle for democracy in Nepal, where as Chakma uprising in Bangladesh, hostilities between the Bodos in Assam, the Muhajirs in Sind have established identity politics. South Asian countries given it's social structures and institutions suffer from structural violence which is killing people slowly preventing them from meeting their basic needs. Therefore, Security in South Asia not only involves freedom from violent/direct conflicts but traditional security issues as well such as individual dignity, water security, environmental security, food security, security from arms, ethnicity and religion. At the same time South Asia is dominated by a strong patriarchal value system which ignores the voices of thousands of women. Women based issues are not considered “important” and they are not even considered “fit” to be a part of policy formulation.