State has failed to protect women, children, says human rights body

GUWAHATI: Women in Governance (WinG), a human rights body, which organized a two-day public hearing on 21 cases of sexual violence in the state, found that the government machinery and the state's child welfare committees have "failed miserably to protect, rehabilitate and even ensure justice to the victims."The organization decided to present its findings to the chief justice of the Gauhati high court as well as the state government to demand corrective measures.The 21 cases from 11 districts included at least eight cases related to sexual assault against minors. One of the key findings of the hearing was that the new laws to protect women and children that were enacted after the Nirbhaya case are still unknown to people in this part of the country."Even the authorities who are in charge of maintaining law and order are quite ignorant about these new laws. Some of these cases happened after the Protection of Children against Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012, was enacted but poor implementation has caused sexual crimes to continue unabated. The national and state human rights institutions, the state and district legal service authorities, the functionaries of criminal justice administration, the child welfare committees are failing," said human rights lawyer Henri Tiphagne at a press conference here.The hearing revealed that in many cases medical reports were manipulated and in one of the cases, the police registered an FIR in 2013 while the incident took place in 2008."We have found that even medical officers sometimes colluded with investigating agencies to protect the accused. DNA tests were not conducted in cases that required them," Henri added.Mentioning how draconian acts like Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, have contributed to decreasing security of women, with many being raped by men in uniform, WinG officials demanded that security personnel should be brought under ordinary law. "The victims and witnesses should be given additional care and protection. A special commission for women should be set up in conflict areas and maximum power to monitor cases and impose penalties should be given to it," said Babloo Loitongbam, executive director of Human Rights Alert (HRA), Manipur."Unless government officials who failed to implement laws and protect victims are prosecuted, women's security will always be at stake," said Gayatri Singh, senior advocate of the Bombay high court.