Maliwal-led DCW dealt with over 50K complaints

The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) under Swati Maliwal on Tuesday came up with the status report of the work they have done in past three years. The data revealed by the DCW Chairperson claimed that they dealt with 52,473 complaints which is an increase of over 700 per cent compared with the work done by the predecessor in eight years.

DCW Chairperson Swati Maliwal claimed that the previous tenure dealt with only 20,000 cases in eight years whereas the present members assumed office in 2015 and from that time Swati Maliwal personally perused over 2,000 cases in three years whereas the previous Chairperson had perused only one case in over eight years. She made over 500 visits to various shelter homes, communities, rape survivors and other women and girls in distress during the tenure and also submitted over 175 policy recommendations to the government whereas the previous commission had submitted only one recommendation in eight years. More than 63,000 hearings were held in the past three years whereas before 2015 only 14,464 hearings were done in eight years. The data accessed by the

Millennium Post claimed that 11,670 sexual assault survivors were counselled by the crisis intervention centre counsellors in the past three years. As many as 6,952 FIRS of sexual assault and sexual harassment were registered after the intervention of the commission in the past three years. Victim compensation in over 559 cases was released to survivors after the commission filed the application in courts. The 181 Women in Distress helpline of the commission acted upon 2.35 lakh calls in the past 2.5 years since its handover from the Delhi Government. In addition, 10,619 complaints were registered with the Mahila Panchayat centres of the commission in various communities in the past two years.

Working for the safety of women, the DCW has also advocated a complete ban on retail sale of acid in Delhi. To ascertain the ground realities, a team of the commission went to 30 shops in Delhi and was able to easily purchase acid from 23 shops without any document. Swati Maliwal dur- ing one of her night inspections of the government-run toilets learnt that large quantity of acid is being stored in open in the toilets and was used for cleaning purposes.

The commission on its own accord appointed three acid attack survivors and 12 acid attack survivors have been engaged by different NGOS running the Mahila Panchayat programme of the commission.

DCW Chief has also found lack of manpower in Delhi Police and also flagged the need of CCTV cameras in police stations.