Govt sanctions Rs.100cr to set up Women Help Desks in Police Stations

Union Home Ministry has sanctioned Rs.100 crore from Nirbhaya fund for setting up and strengthening of women help desks in police stations across country. The move came a fortnight after a young veterinarian was gang-raped and murdered near Hyderabad, leading to protests in different parts of country.

Key Highlights

The scheme would be implemented by states and Union Territories (UTs), and lady police officers would be deployed at these help desks.

The women help desks would focus on making police stations more women-friendly and approachable, as they would be first and single point of contact for any woman walking into a police station.

Women help desks officials would be trained to be sensitive towards women. These help desks would have enlisted panel of experts such as psychologists, lawyers and NGOs to facilitate legal aid, counselling, shelter, rehabilitation and training among others.

About Nirbhaya Fund Framework

It provides for a non-lapsable corpus fund for safety and security of women. This framework is to be administered by Department of Economic Affairs (DEA) of Union Ministry of Finance (MoF). It also provides for an Empowered Committee (EC) of officers headed by Secretary, Union Ministry of Women & Child Development (MWCD) to appraise and recommend proposals to be funded under this framework.

The Ministry of Finance through Department of Economic Affairs (DEA) is the nodal Ministry for any accretion into and withdrawal from corpus. However, MWCD is responsible to review and monitor progress of sanctioned projects/ schemes in conjunction with concerned Central Ministries/ Departments.

Month: Current Affairs - December, 2019