The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Kiran Bedi wants special courts for domestic violence cases

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Sunday, Mar 15, 2009
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Karnataka

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Kiran Bedi wants special courts for domestic violence cases

Special Correspondent

Cases not being disposed of in 60 days, says advocate

— Photo: K. Gopinathan

WORDS OF ASSURANCE: Kiran Bedi (left), retired IPS officer, having a word with dignitaries at the inauguration of the seminar on ‘Domestic violence: issues and challenges’, organised by Women Empowerment Committee in Bangalore on Saturday.

Bangalore: The judiciary should play a “pro-active and innovative” role in implementing Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, and set up special courts to ensure speedy disposal of cases that come under it, said Kiran Bedi, the country’s first woman IPS officer.

Speaking at a seminar on “Domestic Violence: Issues and Challenges”, organised by the Women Empowerment Committee of the Rotary Club of Bangalore on Saturday, she suggested that an expert team be set up to zero in on the reasons for judicial delay.

The discussion followed an observation by High Court advocate Rama Iyer who said that cases were not disposed of within 60 days as stipulated in the Act and emphasised the need for special courts with “sensitive judges” to deal with them.

The former Karnataka State Women’s Commission president Pramila Nesargi said the aggrieved women were not getting interim order within three days as mandated by the Act.

Justice N. Kumar, judge of the High Court, suggested that lawyers invoke the provisions of “writ of mandamus” if the courts were delaying judgment beyond 60 days as provided by the Act.

Ms. Bedi emphasised the need to open more family counselling centres and increase legal literacy on the Act.

There should be regular programmes in the media so that information about the Act was “constantly transmitted” just as commercial advertisements.

She said that “Indian crime clock” on women was ticking at an alarming rate, with one woman beaten every minute, one dowry death occurring every 77 minutes and one act of cruelty on women reported every nine minutes.

On the international scale, India stood third on abuse of women, with 45 per cent of women admitting to suffering it, she said. She said that wives were treated as “utility services” by men.

S.T. Ramesh, Additional Director-General of Police (Recruitment and Training), said that Karnataka police were being trained to deal with “gender-neutral ways” through a UNICEF-funded Gender Sensitisation and People-Friendly Police Project.

However, sexism continued to be a “vexing problem”.

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