‘Many public places unsafe for women’

Many women across the Capital perceive public places as unsafe due to the absence of other women, followed by lack of lighting and last-mile connectivity when using public transport and lesser “eyes on the street”, says a recent audit by prominent NGO Jagori.

A cause for concern, the audit — which was based on the perception of safety in relation to nine different parameters including lighting, the state of walk paths and presence of people, specifically women, on the streets — found prominent stretches in Central and South Delhi to be “unsafe”. Among these are Man Singh Road, Pandara Road, Bhishma Pitamah Marg, Moolchand Flyover and the Vasant Kunj-Mehrauli Road. Conducted through Safetipin, a map-based online and mobile phone application that seeks to make communities and cities safer by collecting and disseminating safety-related information through crowd sourcing and physical audits, Jagori’s representatives presented their latest findings to the Delhi Police top-brass, including Commissioner B.S. Bassi at an open session here on Friday.

Women’s rights activist and former head of Jagori, Kalpana Vishwanath, said the report had also been shared with the Delhi government’s Public Works Department (PWD), the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) and the Transport Department, apart from the centrally-administered Urban Development Ministry. According to Ms. Vishwanath, as many as 14,726 safety audits had been conducted by Jagori in Delhi beginning from September, 2013. These covered 1,924 locations leading to the recording of 476 “hazards” and 86 incidents of harassment.

The audit posited that walk paths across Delhi scored above average in terms of a perception of safety while light, openness, visibility, crowd and public transport all have average scores. Security scored the lowest of all the audit parameters, followed by gender usage.

“Visible security, both public and private, is poor in the city and few women are present in public spaces, especially after dark. While there is not a significant difference among the regions, the Central part of Delhi scores higher in several parameters,” said Ms. Vishwanath.

While North Delhi also scored higher in some parameters, West Delhi scored the lowest in all parameters except gender usage where, ironically, South Delhi had a very low score. Another finding, that of the perception of being unsafe when commuting via public transport due to lack of last-mile connectivity, which the Delhi government too is in agreement with, was revealed through the audit. This even as several modes of public transport, such as e-rickshaws and grameen sewa vehicles were found unsafe by most respondents, according to Rashee Mehra, who co-authored a report on the audit with Ms. Vishwanath.

The bus terminal at Nehru Place scored the lowest among the six terminals audited owing to lack of proper lighting, lack of openness and virtually no security. On the other hand, terminals at Uttam Nagar, Shivaji Stadium and Azadpur scored higher mostly because of a “gender-balanced crowd”.

While Ms. Vishwanath submitted that the police needed to do more to add to a sense of safety for Delhi’s women, Mr. Bassi said his force was already in the process of doing so through extra deployment, in addition to relying on making more and more women “fight-ready” through emphasis on self defence training.

An audit conducted by NGO Jagori, based on perception of safety, has found that many prominent stretches in Central and South Delhi are seen as “unsafe

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Delhi’s top cop, DCW chief see eye-to-eye on women’s safety

The conclusion of Hindustan Times’ week-long series on the rape menace in the Capital saw police chief BS Bassi and Delhi Commission for Women chief Swati Maliwal come together to talk about making the city safer for women and finding lasting solutions.

The four-part series highlighted areas in the city with the highest rape reports.

Bassi and Maliwal, perceived to be on opposing sides after the recent confrontation between the AAP government and the police force, affirmed they would work together to ensure a better environment for women. They were joined by civil society activists Ranjana Kumari and  Kalpana Viswanath at the brainstorming session.

The encounter between Bassi and Maliwal also came on the same day the DCW chief wrote to the top cop seeking information on several complaints of crimes against women — including rape, molestation and sexual harassment — in the city from 2012 onwards.

Maliway also sought to know the total strength of the city police force and the number of women in its ranks in order to conduct a study on women’s safety.

“We need to work in collaboration with the police and the government for better infrastructure. We also need to improve policing and have a redressal mechanism for cases where the police do not act,” Maliwal said at the HT session.

Agreeing on the need for cooperation, Bassi said both the police and government should not waste time on post-mortems and work towards concrete results.

“Rather than focus on individual issues, we must look at the larger picture. We should see how we can move ahead together and we are ready for it. I hope to work in close coordination with the DCW as it can act as a bridge between the government and the police when it comes to crimes against women. The organisation can motivate other government agencies that don’t give any consideration to crimes against women,” he said.

However, drawing a direct correlation between rising cases of rape and the economic and living conditions of people, Bassi said it was ultimately the government that could actually make a difference.

Ranjana Kumari said the game of political football between the state, Centre and Delhi Police had affected the working of organisations set up to deal with such crimes. “We have to look at the condition of gender resource centres, rape crisis centres and crisis mediation centres and the way their working has been affected over the past few months. The poor condition of these centres is hitting ground work,” she said.

Infrastructure can make all the difference, said Kalpana Viswanath. “Having basics like toilets and streetlights in place goes a long way in making women feel safe but the city comes up short on these counts.” She also said there was a need to look at redressal systems beyond policing.

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