WOMEN EMPOWERMENT THROUGH HOLISTIC DEVELOPMENT: LESSONS FROM TAGORE’S “THE MOTHER’S PRAYER” AND NEP 2020

This paper proposes a blueprint for women’s empowerment through the convergence of the ethical vision in Rabindranath Tagore’s dramatic poem, ‘The Mother’s Prayer,’ and India’s National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. For too long, conventional narratives on women's empowerment have emphasized socio-economic measures while overlooking the fundamental role of inner, moral strength. It also suggests that empowerment extends beyond material values and calls for empathy for the oppressed, ultimately leading to the moral courage to do justice (Dharma). Following a critical reading of Tagore’s work, we explore Queen Gandhari’s assertion of her desire to disown her unrighteous son, not as an act of power-assertion, but as a powerful commitment to ethics. This Tagorean ideal is now contrasted with the NEP 2020’s core principles of a holistic, multidisciplinary, and value-based education. The policy’s focus on critical thinking, ethical reasoning, and concrete measures, such as the Gender-Inclusion Fund, offers a contemporary pedagogical trajectory for cultivating the virtues Tagore valorises. The paper posits that the coming together of Tagore’s philosophy and the NEP 2020’s structure provides a powerful, yet culturally rooted, alternative model for women’s empowerment, which fully prepares women with not only 21st century competences, but also with the personal and ethical agency to reimagine what success and leadership looks like in a fair and equitable world.