Measures taken by govt. to prevent Crime against Women…

New Delhi, Dec 10 (HS): Union Minister of State for Home Affairs G. Kishan Reddy said that women safety is a high priority for the Government and several initiatives have been taken for safety of women across the country. He was replying to a question in the Lok Sabha here today.

He said that the Criminal Law (Amendment), Act 2013 was enacted for effective deterrence against sexual offences. Further, the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2018 was enacted to prescribe even more stringent penal provisions including death penalty for rape of a girl below the age of 12 years. The Act also inter-alia mandates completion of investigation and trials within 2 months each, he replied.

Reddy said that Emergency Response Support System provides a pan-India, single, internationally recognized number (112) based system for all emergencies, with computer aided dispatch of field resources to the location of distress.

Besides, using technology to aid smart policing and safety management, Safe City Projects have been sanctioned in first Phase in 8 cities including Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Lucknow and Mumbai.

The MHA has also launched a cyber-crime portal on last year in September for citizens to report obscene content. The Ministry has also launched the ‘National Database on Sexual Offenders’ (NDSO) last year to facilitate investigation and tracking of sexual offenders across the country by law enforcement agencies, said the Minister.

The Ministry has also implemented One Stop Centre (OSC) scheme across the country since April 2015 which is exclusively designed to provide integrated services such as medical aid, police assistance, legal counselling/ court case management, psycho-social counselling and temporary shelter to women affected by violence under one roof, Reddy said. He also said that 728 OSCs have been approved by the government and 595 OSCs of those are operational in the country.