The Delhi Police was an object of ridicule on Wednesday in the Delhi High Court as it observed that the agency has been carrying out sensitisation drive and other measures to prevent crimes against women in areas where no such incidents are reported. The court’s remark came after going through the crime-mapping charts and tables submitted by the Delhi Police following the court’s order to undertake the exercise.
“On going through the charts and accompanying table, we find the data to be quite revealing. It appears that there are certain pockets in Delhi where crimes of this nature (against women) occur more frequently than others. These areas should be regarded as those where immediate action, like increased policing, gender sensitisation drives, public awareness campaigns should be initiated,” the bench said, adding “what is the point in having gender sensitisation drive in Mandir Marg or Tilak Marg where there are no such crimesIJ”
The court further said a “rifled approach” is needed to tackle the issue of crimes against women, particularly now when the crime-mapping data is available. “Have a rifled approach. You have these areas in sight. Increased policing in these areas can be effective. If you police, eve-teasing, molestation and rapes will go down,” the bench said.
After perusing the charts and table submitted by the Delhi Police, the bench observed crimes against women are confined to “semi-urban and semi-rural areas” of the city while Central Delhi and purely rural areas are free from instances of such offences. “A sociologist should go there and see the reason for such crimes occurring there,” the court said, adding there are many other urbanised villages where such crimes do not occur.
A bench of acting Chief Justice BD Ahmed and Justice S Mridul also noted that crimes against women in the national Capital occur more often in a few “pockets” of the city, particularly areas which have undergone rapid urbanisation. Meanwhile, the bench directed Delhi police to file a status report “indicating the measures they have taken after crime-mapping was done and measures they propose to take to bring down these crimes so that such crimes, if not completely eradicated, should be greatly reduced” and listed the matter for further hearing on May 21.
The crime-mapping exercise was undertaken by the Delhi Police on the orders of the court on a PIl filed by Nandita Dhar through advocate Gaurav Kumar Bansal alleging instances of eve-teasing in Delhi had increased by over 700 per cent in 2013.