Centre for Social Research (CSR), a women's rights organization, today demanded effective utilisation of central government funds like the Nirbhaya Fund to create One-Stop women protection centres across the country.
CSR demanded that the funds be used to set up these protection centres in the 100 most violence prone districts in the country.
"Several central government funds earmarked for women and child development are gathering dust. The government must at least ensure that the Nirbhaya Fund is effectively utilized by setting up one stop women protection centres where victims can seek complete relief in all forms and are not sent away to different locations and agencies to fend for themselves," said Dr Ranjana Kumari, Director of CSR.
Women protection centres are safe spaces for women where temporary shelter, free legal aid, medical relief and psycho-social counseling services are provided to women in distress.
These are meant to serve as a single window system for resolving all cases of violence against women.
Kumari further said that the National Mission for Empowerment of Women (NMEW) was conceived as a machinery to promote an all-round development and empowerment of women and the National Mission Authority (NMA) was being headed by the ex-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
"Women's rights NGOs had high hopes from it however, since its inception almost 4 years ago, not even a single meeting has been chaired to review the progress.
"Due to the neglect of such important bodies like the NMEW, coupled with the increasing number of cases of violence against women, one stop women protection centres are an absolute necessity," she stressed.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau, a total of 2,44,270 incidents of crime against women were reported in the country during the year 2012 as compared to 2,28,650 in the year 2011 recording an increase of 6.4 per cent.
