The National Commission for Women (NCW) on Saturday directed the State Government to immediately constitute a ‘Special Taskforce’ to conduct regular raids on all hotels and lodgings in Bhubaneswar to ensure that they strictly adhere to the enforcement codes, maintain a regular register with details of all guests staying at their establishments.
The direction came after an incident in which an instructor of a Government-run vocational training institute in the city raped a deaf and dumb student of the institute in a lodge near Baramunda. Besides, the NCW directed the Government to form gender sensitivity committees in all educational institutes in the city which will have representation from among lady students to deal with any case of harassment and assaults, besides directing to bring private hostels into the purview of the special task force and ensure regular checks on these private hostels.
The commission too directed the Government to adequately compensate the victim and to bear all expenditures of the victim’s parents accrued in course of prosecution owing to the distance of their place of domicile. The Government was directed to appoint a Special Public Prosecutor with good reputation for trial of the case in court, trial in Fast Track Court and ensure in providing employment to the victim.
Notably, taking cognisance of the incident of the rape of the deaf and dumb girl, the NCW had constituted a two-member inquiry committee consisting of its members Hemlata Kheria and Manasi Pradhan. The committee visited the State, recorded the statements of the victim and her parents at Baripada, statements of witnesses in Bhubaneswar, visited spot of crime and made a detailed inquiry into the circumstances that led to the incident.
“The committee found that the unfortunate incident could have been averted had there been a strict police control on all hotels and lodges in the city,” said committee member Manasi Pradhan. Pradhan said the victim has used this laxity in security to coerce deaf and dumb girls into the same lodge repeatedly. Even on the day the police raided the lodge to arrest the culprit, another deaf and dumb girl was found detained in the lodge by the same culprit.
“Curiously enough, none of the rooms in the lodge was found to be booked in the culprit’s name nor the persons managing the lodge had any information regarding girls detained by the culprit there,” rued Pradhan, adding that it exposed serious loopholes in women security in the city.