Although the rate of crime against women is much less in our State in comparison to most of the States in the country, yet the State Government would not take any chance on this count owing to increasing incidents of crime against women in the country. India is not in a happy position in regard to protection of women against various crimes. In past few years, India has come on the list of countries where crime against women is rampant. This is indeed shameful. Given the history of our civilization and the overall temper of Indian society, it is most disappointing to note that our society has deviated from millennia long tradition of showing remarkable respect to women and not doing anything that hurts the womanhood. May be because of the rising graph of our economic status and the lengthening shadow of western culture, aberrations are creeping into the society and it has moved towards degeneration. Anyway, protection of women and showing them due respect is a very serious and urgent matter which not only the Government but the Indian society as such has to tackle, The role of religious institutions in promoting means of protection to women and changing the basic thinking among people cannot be underestimated. We have numerous women organizations and they are trying to tackle the question but given the size of our country and its populations, women organizations alone cannot do the needful.
A major hurdle in providing foolproof protection to the women and punishing the culprits who assault them is the inadequacy of the laws that govern the cases of atrocities against women. This deficiency has been pointed out by the courts including the Supreme Court. Therefore, foolproof protection to the women is an exercise in which a number of agencies are involved. We have a plethora of laws that are aimed at safeguarding the interests of women. From time to time, the legislative organ makes more enactments in this direction and this is an ongoing process. But having a plethora of laws does not make sense in reality. What is needed is proper implementation of the law and bringing the culprits to book within the shortest possible time.
Apart from the judiciary and social media that have great responsibility of ensuring protection of women against crime and high-handedness, it is the police that have to shoulder the maximum burden of responsibility in this area. A problem with the police is that generally our victimized women are shy to report the cases of victimization to the police because it is a matter of their modesty. Our women are highly conscious of social stigma. The impression is that registering a case of molestation or ill treatment or cheating etc. puts the female victim in an embarrassing situation. More often than not, the affected women avoid reporting the matter to the police. In this way the culprits get encouraged to perpetrate more crime against women. Another aspect connected with this is that some of the police authorities are not very sensitive to the crime committed against women and they take it very lightly to the discouragement of the victimized women. Conversely also, sometimes, police overplay a case related to crime against women and the victim feels herself in a very awkward situation owing to media hype given to her case. These are all the ground realities and nobody can deny that this is the truth.
State Cabinet has taken this issue into consideration and has decided to set up four new police stations exclusively manned by the women police force. At present we have only two women police stations, one in Jammu and the other in Srinagar. The cabinet has approved news women police stations for the towns of Anantnag, Baramulla, Rajouri and Udhampur. These will be entirely manned by women police staff. The Cabinet has approved the total number of functionaries that will be on the strength of these four new police stations. The Cabinet decision is for creation of 208 posts for these four women police stations— 52 posts for each women police station. The 208 posts include four posts of Inspector, four posts of Sub-Inspector, 8 posts of Assistant Sub-Inspector, 24 posts of Head Constable, 136 posts of Constable and 32 posts of Follower.
This is a very remarkable decision and has to be appreciated in full. The first and foremost benefit of these stations to the women of the State is that they will have no more hesitation to go to a woman police station and get their complaint registered. The second benefit is that only women police staff and officers will be conducting investigation and the fear of undue publicity to the case will be reduced considerably. The third and the most important benefit is that women police stations are expected to be empathetic towards the women applicants and chances of quick justice through the instrument of women police officers are far greater than ordinary police stations. It is likely that once these new women police stations become productively functional and successful, the government may like to extend the security cover to other towns and districts also in future. We compliment the Government for this very progressive step.
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