The women approaching police seeking justice in complaints related to domestic violence are facing problems, as the counsellor system has been abolished from the police stations of the city.
At present, only women cops are providing counselling to the complainants. However, in want of professional counsellor, the counselling process is getting delayed and the cases are not being redressed properly.
Earlier, the helpdesk for women were at nine centres in nine police stations across the city, but in August they have stopped functioning. And since then, the complainants are facing problems. Senior Superintendent of Police Raman Singh Sikarwar said that the counselors were paid through Swadhar Scheme funded by the Central Government but the scheme ended few months ago and as it was a Central Government run scheme the consultancy fee of the consultants was stopped. At present the process of retaining the counsellors and availing their services has been started but this time the counsellors would be selected on merit and they would be have to provide their services voluntarily.
One of the main reasons behind discontinuation of the counsellors’ services was that the SSP received complaints against the counsellors for forced compromises and other things impose forcefully which resulted into unwanted results.
“Now good, skilled and experienced counsellors would be included in the system to help the woman complainants,” Sikarwar said, adding that few of the counsellors have started providing counselling and others would be deployed soon.
The nine police stations which earlier had the services of counsellors are Mahila police station, Hanumanganj, Mangalwara, Gautam Nagar, Shahjehanabad, Kotwali, Talaiya, Habibganj and Bairagarh police stations.