Session 1- Presentation on the new CEDAW publication in Hindi

Shalini Singh – Release of CEDAW book

She begun by congratulating Action India for publishing CEDAW in simple language understood by everyone. Before this publication there was no material in Hindi. It is important to remember that CEDAW was an important tool for making the PWDVA, 2005. In the book the concept of equality has been explained well. On page 6 there is mention on why the law is in favour of women. It also highlights the role of the state in maintaining gender equality. The three role of the state – respect, fulfill and secure – has been clearly defined in CEDAW. On page 9 of the book the role of the NGO has been defined. Here it is important to mention that NGOs have a special role specially when reporting to the UN. The NGOs shadow report on the convention can highlight the problems being faced in the implementation of the PWDVA, 2005. Further the book also mentions human rights issues related to health, freedom and religion. Page 15 mention the rights of pregnant women in accessing public services. At
the end after reading the book the last page questions the different identities associated with any person besides being a women, that is, nation, state, religion and income group. Most of these identities have been associated with patriarchal structure and mentions of these make women question them. Therefore the issue of human rights, violence against women, women’s rights are all mentioned in the book.

Soma Parthasarthy – Relevance of CEDAW in implementing PWDVA, 2005

Soma drew the attention to the historical significance of CEDAW. She mentioned that CEDAW is an important weapon for strengthening women’s right at the international level. It will get more strengthened the more it used to combat violence against women. The book is a strong link for dissemination of information for greater understanding of the convention.

CEDAW is a legal document at international level adopted by the UN. Women’s movement has been vocal in demanding this kind f document in order to report on violations of women’s human rights from homes to factories to jungles by military or by the men on roads. Women’s movement helped in strengthening voices of women from different parts of the globe to force government to use the convention to understand women’s right are human rights and there is urgent need to develop measure to combat violence against women.

Indian government took eight years to sign the document. The first and second shadow report was done by educated women however the women’s movement made an attempt to make important inputs from the ground. In the third report the voice of women from the ground was given priority. The government made promises that where women’s rights have been recognized step taken to strategize implementation and where not recognized attempt made to recognize them as women’s right. CEDAW provides the space to question the government on the steps taken for implementation of PWDVA, 2005. The shadow report represents the voice from the ground whereas the government report only make refers to statistics and figures. There is need to read both the report and compare it to find gaps.

I am a member of the Women’s Empowerment Committee for Action Plan. The committee has been asked after 7 years to prepare a report. This is the time we can ask the government on what it has done to implement the law. We can use the report as a tool at local level to report the problems faced by Mahila Panchayat. The MP network does not only deal with cases but with real life experiences of women and it important to place CEDAW in the functioning of the Panchayat. CEDAW as a policy document is relevant in MP networking. It recognizes that we have this right and when violations we have remedies under national and international standards. CEDAW shows the way ahead to move forward.

Question & Suggestion

Gouri Choudhury agreed on the suggestion that the we can use the Action Plane report to put across the problems being faced in the implementation of PWDVA, 2005. She further added that the Delhi Model is a good model for vigilance and can play an important role in reporting with help of Soma Parthasarthy. Soma being member of the action plan drafting policy – we all can give your suggestions to her to be included in the draft action plan.

Shalini appraised the fact that the protection officers are well aware of CEDAW and that their training includes reference to CEDAW. However she was concerned with the negative attitude of the judiciary. She made reference to recent statement made by member of judiciary that women are themselves responsible for violence by the kind of dress they wear. The judiciary gives the message that safety and security of women possible only when they protect themselves.

Zayeeda from Surnirman stated that this is the result of the negative attitude of men towards women and in the community it is seen that mindset of men has not changed. Even educated men have the same perspective. She questioned the mindset of the judiciary by giving the example of police men raping a mad woman on the road. In such situation who is responsible for the crime. Therefore it is important to change mindset of men across all class.

Another example where women’s safety and security is not dependable on the dress of the women was given by Reena Bannerjee. She gave the example of rape of three year old girl by men.

Satish from MASAW mentioned that in such situation it is important to work with men. Because there is the rumor that PWDVA, 2005 is against men and this had to be corrected. Another problem is that in Lucknow the protection officers have taken on the role of counselors and this is affecting the work of the judiciary. In a case study carried out in Pune it has been found out that judged are not giving interim order without listening to men as they are of opinion that without that it would be causing injustice to men. So at the same time there is need to work with POs and judiciary. It is important to remove the feeling that men are enemy of women. There should be wide dissemination on CEDAW giving the message that it is along human right and not for men and women. Men are also victims of violence, one instance is when they identity is being questioned. The future should be towards gender equality.

Shalini suggested that if we work keeping in minds the question of rights then there will be no departmentalization and difference on different ground.

Kamla from Partners in Law and Development mentioned that there were some limitations in the book on CEDAW. The third model of gender equality as mentioned in the CEDAW is not clear in the book. As per the convention there are three model of equality. The first model talks of equality at work. Second model mentions that if women feel insecure at workplace she has the right not to work during the time or place. And the third model states that it is the obligation of the government to insure security of women in situation where their security is under threat. For example the government has to make arrangement of pick and drop for girls working in call centre. Another area that is not clear in the book is the question why is the need to have CEDAW when human rights have been recognized. The answer is that within human rights there are two types of right- civil/political right & cultural/social rights. Women’s rights are social and cultural rights. Human rights did not recognize
social and cultural rights and therefore not strong on women’s right.

Nisha from Bal Vikas Dhara stated that when we talk of gender equality then why do we talk for reservation seats for women. When we talk of reservation of seats it gives the impression that we are a different class/category needing protection, there is also question of difference on ground of gender.

Soma Parthasarthy in reply to the above question said that our constitution says that if a group has been marginalized over a period then they have to be provided with opportunity for growth and development. Prior to 33% reservation of seat for women in Panchayat there was zero percent participation of women. Gender was used as a strategy to keep women out of politics. Reservation is a short term measure needed to achieve long term goal of gender equality.

The next issue of the issue of 33%- there was lot of debates and discussion on the percentage. Our argument was that reservation should not be just a matter of symbolic representation but an opportunity to create space for women. If one woman in a gathering of men – she will remain silent – if two she will sit with the other women and still remain silent but if three they will speak up However it is not how much but what is relevant is the fact that reservation is helping in changing the status of women in society. The struggle is ongoing and goal is from 33% to 50% and from villages to parliament.

Session 2 – Presentation from Zonal Committees

Priyanka –Project coordinator from Action India gave an introduction to the zonal committee of Mahila Panchayat network. She said that in September 2007 with the expansion of Mahila Panchayat, zonal committees were formed in the four zones of Delhi to work at zonal level for implementation of PWDVA,2005. In each zone there are 20 members. In each zone we have formed a core group in our zone and also developed policy guideline for effective functioning. The zonal committee meets every month to plan strategy for future action; they also share their problems and experience to help each other to solve cases. There is also a coordination meeting at Action India for sharing of work experience and problems and to prepare future plan. The advantage of the zonal committee is that it provides space for collective work and also for interaction with government departments.

The following representative from the zonal committee made presentation on the work done in each zone:

· Satish- East Zone

· Lalita- West Zone

· Nirmal- South Zone

· Santosh- North Zone

Satish- East Zone

• There are 6 NGOs working in the East Zone- Aadhar, Lady Help, Surnirman, Action India, DBS & BARD.
• Wide dissemination on PWDVA
• Working in partnership with police, CAW cell, we ask for their advice and support for solving cases
• Working with social welfare department
• Organized legal camp with DLSA
• Some of the problems being faced in solving the cases are long court procedure, unavailability of POs, negative attitude and lack of understanding among SHOs and magistrates

Lalita – West Zone

• There are five NGOs in this zone - Vikasini, guild of sevice, MRYDO, Action India & Navshristhi
• Have been working with POs for dissemination of information to raise awareness on the new law.
• Organizing regular meeting with SHGs in Nangloi
• Training of women police officer on domestic violence law
• Networking with Parivartan for woking in partnership with them
• Initiated talks with DCP Hooda for training and working with Delhi police in our zone.
• Developed a database of NGOs and service providers in our zone for easy access.
• Training of SHOs from Najafgharh police station and there is demand for more gender training for police personnel.

Nirmal- South Zone

· There are five NGOs in the south zone- Mamta, NDS, BVD, Navshristi & Action India.

· Conducted training on PWDVA, 2005 for mahila Panchayat members and housewives

· Developed a strategy for directly meeting POs in the court as they are not easily available

· Area wise all NGOs including those not directly working on domestic violence and were informed about PWDVA, 2005

· Organized a rally in the zone during which we distributed leaflet informing people of the new law

· Conducted gender training of 22 constables from Ambedkar Nagar police station

Santosh- North Zone

· There are 5 NGOs in the zone- CSI, YCM, Action India,

· Wide dissemination of information carried out with doctors, police, beat officers and police

· We have been able to successfully solve three cases

· Trained agaanwadi workers on DV Act

· We go directly to the court for solving cases of domestic violence

· Our goal is towards effective implementation of PWDVA, 2005

Session 3 - Leena’s presentation on the Delhi Model on PWDVA

Leena made a presentation on the Delhi model on PWDVA, 2005 being developed with the Mahila Panchayat network for effective implementation of the law.

The Beginning

• In 2003 – 2004, AI and its MP network started advocacy in support of the DV law. 70, 000 signatures demanding a civil law on DV was collected and submitted to the Govt.

• In 2005 when the law was passed, we were part of the National Conferene to demand for early Rules and early notification of the DV Act

• In 2006, again when the PWDVA was put into action, we convened a National Conference to chart out a road map for its effective and proper implementation.

• In 2007, we moderated a e-diccusion on eliciting ideas to implement the PWDVA successfully and we got a tremendous response from 72 members of the community

• That s how we began and here we are today – trying hard to bring multiple agencies together in Delhi, learning from other state models, specially AP, and the work continues.

Our mission

• Monitoring the functioning of the law: is it serving its intended purpose?

• Providing a coordinated respond to domestic violence by recognizing the role of other agencies such as NGO’s the medical profession, shelter homes and the police in assisting the prevention, protection, building support structures, capacity building on domestic violence.

Ø This is a institutional model

Ø It is also a Multi Stakeholders Model involving following STAKEHOLDERS at common platform

• Protection Officer

• Delhi police – sustained meetings / interactions : led to a NGO- Police partnership that is equal and mutual.

• DLSA – sustained mutual interaction leading to participatory working – hence role of judiciary, especially Magistrates in Delhi

• DCW – limited to MP network

• State Govt.: Delhi Department of WCD – newly created body in August 2007 – previous work with DSW (Sonika Singh - delegation)

• NGOs

• Communities

• SPs: FCCs, WDC of Colleges

Our Common Understanding:

Domestic violence against women is a pervasive violation of human rights that inflicts physical, psychological, sexual and economic harm and effectively denies women the right to equality, security, dignity, self - worth and their right to enjoy fundamental freedoms. It is here that the PPWDVA offers holistic but emergency protection and is a speedy justice law. We believe that violence is an impediment to society’s development and it is not merely an issue of women. Hence we work with women, men, girls and boys.

Our Common Understanding:

Domestic violence against women is a pervasive violation of human rights that inflicts physical, psychological, sexual and economic harm and effectively denies women the right to equality, security, dignity, self - worth and their right to enjoy fundamental freedoms. It is here that the PPWDVA offers holistic but emergency protection and is a speedy justice law. We believe that violence is an impediment to society’s development and it is not merely an issue of women. Hence we work with women, men, girls and boys.

For better and effective co-ordination: we formed Delhi Secretariat:

• divided Delhi into four zones

• one Zonal committee in each zone

• each zonal committee comprising 5-6 CBOs

• each zonal committee having about 15 individual members

• one central exchange and discussion meeting and one monthly zonal level meeting

• NS supporting local travel and meeting expenses

• Each committee has own rules and targets - autonomy

Task undertaken

• Meeting and building rapport with area PO, SP, Police, NGOs etc

• Creating and keeping data base of entire zone – MLAs, local counselors of MCD, police stations and chowkis, medical, shelter, legal aid, lawyers, hospitals, dispensaries - phones and names – meeting each head personally to talk about the DV Law

• Providing assistance to PO in home visit, home search, service of notice

• Making home visit reports for and on behalf of PO

• Follow up and monitoring court case if in their area

• Assisting women, taking her to court directly in some cases – DIRECT ACCESS TO JUSTICE

• Liasoning with DLSA to get legal aid – follow up with lawyer

• Trainings – social, legal and with police.

• Capacity Building of ourselves and others.

• Advocacy and awareness building on PWDVA local levels – developing role plays, songs, IEC material, street plays, placards, banners etc

• And before doing for others, we have ourselves undergone several day long intensive trainings on understating the scope of the new law and ways of filling DIR, approaching Magistrates and documenting case files. Eg Vikasini case documentation is like any DCW notings –

• Court cases undertaken with or without PO – our aim is to lessen the burden of Pos – assist them and not overburden them. Documentation by network important. And hence building up KNOWLEDGE BASE.

Gains

• Thus we are now a workforce of more than 1200 women, based inside the communities, with the affected victims, round the clock available and also willing to go in delegation to meet govt. representatives with our charter of demands / proposal for assistance / directly to court to get immediate relief to women and ensure that the court orders are implemented and law put to its best use.

• Networking to cover entire state of Delhi.

• Collective strength in common ways of working for one cause.

Areas of concern:

• POs as OFFICERS – So that we can move ahead with ideas such as mobile phones and e – groups for them

• NGOs such as AI not being registered as SP

• Court Cases.

• No medical facility have been notified

• Lack of awareness and publicity by Govt.

• One help desk on PWDVA at DWCD – So one designated officer

Future Plan

• Meetings on PWDVA with other NGOs

• Hoarding on the Act in bus stops and public places

• Meetings with our area magistrates

• Work in colleges/school

• Form street plays and nataks on PWDVA

• Media contact

• Working with Youth.

• Building up Monitoring indicators.

Barkha Singh, Chairperson Delhi Commission for Women

There is urgent need to work at grassroot level for proper implementation of the law and Mahila Panchayat is working in this direction. The Delhi government has recently launced two important schemes- mobile van and the Ladli scheme. Our goal is to reach every girl. Around 40,000 girls have been identified under the new scheme and we intend to give an amount of Rs 600 to widows, Rs 600 to widows and Rs 25,000 at the time of marriage of a girl of widows. There is increase in divorce cases in the young generation, girls and boys are opting for divorce within few days/months of their marriage. The reason is that they do not understand the meaning of marriage and divorce. DCW is opening a counseling centre in the central office for married couple and also for those planning to marry. The centre is going to be functional from April 2008. It is important to mention that men have an important role in ending violence against women. If men realize that
women have a right to life – to live a life of dignity, a life without violence –then there will be no violence. There is need for sensitization and the Mahila Panchayat network is doing this in its own ways. As important strategy it important for regular monitoring and monitoring meetings should be planned to discuss problems and solutions.

AFTERNOON SESSION with DCW, Delhi Police, Dept of Social Welfare and Protection Officers.

Jyotsna Chatterjee, the chair of the afternoon session began with her congratulation to all women on 8th March. She mentioned that in the morning the vice president highlighted that violence against women is a social evil and has to be looked at along with other problem of health and education. However he neglected the fact that as women they are suffering violence. In her meeting with the prime minister she was of opinion that the PM is serious about placing the 33% reservation for women in the parliament. Coming to PWDVA, she mentioned that there is lack of infrastructure and it is the right time to access what we have achieved from new law, also to assess who are partners and what are their functions.

Justice Manju Goel started with her interest in learning about the new law from different stakeholders, especially learn from the experience of the protection officers. She drew attention to the new law on Prevention of Child Marriage Act, 2006 as an important legislation.

CEDAW is important with reference to the content of domestic violence. It is the first International Charter for recognizing women’s right. The era before this did not consider inequality between men and women as an issue. After the coming of the convention gender inequality was recognized as social problem. The first move in the direction was in 1966 with civil and political rights talking on inequality between men and women.

Justice Manju referred to the definition of discrimination as mention in CEDAW, discrimination refers to distinction, restriction & exclusion preventing women’s course of development in parallel to men. Laws are being made keeping in mind this definition of gender discrimination. Sex based discrimination is banned under CEDAW. Indian constitution bans all forms of sex discrimination and in this context Indian constitution is ahead of many other countries.

Special law for women guaranteed under our constitution guaranteeing equality in all field. The state has ratified convention for making a law to bring about gender equality. Various steps and measures are being taken by the government to bring about gender equality; steps have been taken to prevent violence within the family with passage of PWDVA, 2005 and prevention of child marriage with the new Child Marriage Prevention Act, 2006. However in spite all these step gender based discrimination continues in our society. In political field there is only 8% women in politics, in social realm women still continue to have a low status, in the economic field women are in general paid less in spite of the policy on equal pay for equal work, women have no say in property even though it is recognized under law. Legislation exists only on paper and is never effective. Gender stereotype is a form of discrimination- ascribed role going on for ages. Even in situation of equality gender roles have
been ascribed in our minds and this cannot be changed by law. This is manifested from the high school drop out among girls(66% )and the low sex ratio(927) and increase in polyandry.

Violence against women is the main cause preventing the development of women and it is a social mechanism to force women into subordinate position. The lack of implementation of PWDVA indicates hands off approach of the government. There is criticism that the new law is allowing police inside home; into personal lives. The definition of domestic violence includes several form (sexual, physical, emotional and economic). The CEDAW convention recognizes violence in a home and calls it domestic violence- first definition in the convention.

Data from different study reveal the high occurrence of violence against women. According to NHFS III around 37% married women suffer physical violence. According to study by UNFPA around 70% women in the age 15-49 suffer domestic violence,u UNICEF study finds around 69 million witness violence in home. So the question arises how to we deal with such a acute problem. The state responded by amending the IPC in 1994 to include provision for protecting women against violence by adding section 498A and also making laws for curbing dowry.

Our culture compels women to stay in their home. Absence of alternative home forces them to continue to live in violent relation. The new Act is victim oriented in which the two important players are protection officers and service providers to provide service to victims. There is a big expectation in the law from the service providers. “Har mohalla main ek Ghar” is a concept that I personally feel should be initiated in each locality with support of service providers. If in each locality we have at least one room where victims of violence can take shelter be provided. The rent can be shared by NGOs working in the areas or the victim can also be allowed to stay as paying guest. This is a request that I make to the Mahila Panchayat network.

Bulbul Das-AIWA

Around 200 women help line. There is a large grant under gender mainstreaming. The shelter home called ‘Bablu House’ should be renamed as mother/Maa Ghar. The shelter home should be linked with DCW. Our counseling centre is at 6, Bhagwan Das Road.

Sharmistha Sharma-Department of Social Welfare

I want to make a small comment. To celebrate women’s day without men is not a good idea. We need to walk with me rather than walk alone. We should celebrate with our partners and counter partners. We see the number of men present here is very less so we should pledge that in the next year celebration we bring with us our male partners also.

Comment by Chair-Jyotsna Chatterjee

We all know thet domestic violence is on the increase. Earlier we had a criminal law that was silent on protection of women. Now we have a victim centered law and we have to see how government and women’s group becomes service provider.

Sanjay Sharma- DLSA

There are several practical problems being faced in the implementation of the law. We have to find and understand the causes and consequences of domestic violence. The judiciary is being given direction for implementation of various schems. For law to work and for it to reach the subject for whom made are two different issues. We have the Delhi police and women’s group working with us yet we are facing problem in implementing it. There is the need to change mindset. Now is the stage for formation and not reformation. There has to be formation of equality from the beginning.

Sharmistha Sharma

There are 18 POs working in Delhi and if that is not enough then even 18000 will not work because our collective strength is declining and social bonds is weakening. Let me inform Mr Sanjay Sharma that DLSA has been notified as service provider as per dept of social welfare.

Bonani Dhar-UNIFEM, Solution Exchange

UNIFEM has been working very closely with Action India in building the Delhi model. POs need to share and meet at common point. There is need for formation of E-community for all POs. there is also need to provide personal computers/laptops to Pos to enable them to be part of e-dicussions.

Sangita Dhingra-DLSA

There is need to change mindset not only of men but also among women. We have seen that in our house when 2 women are fighting the third women feels positive in seeing her position being strengthened, this has to change and then only can we be able to so something.

Chair

Violence happens not only on women but also on me but of different nature and magnitude. Violence against women is happening because women are treated as subordinates and powerless. There is need to change such mindset of both men and women. We are moving towards this direction.

Rashmi Singh- Director, Department of Social Welfare

First of all let us all congratulate ourselves for being together on the occasion of women’s day. Participation of POs in the workshop is a small part of larger gamut. There is need for synergy between different stakeholder and also identification of service providers, legal counseling centre and health services. There is the need for having one nodal office for all service providers where they can meet for coordination and sharing of problems. We have to look at all dimensions.

Need to build a convergence strategy to address issue of domestic violence. That is problem of domestic violence has to be seen in other laws also. Another strategy is having public-private partnership – people need to work in synergy with each other. No department is complete in itself. There is need to effect the holistic convergence in the institutional model being build to address domestic violence. It is not departmental alone in the government, need to operationalization of bigger system else the struggle will go on for several years.

Domestic violence needs convergence and for this we need to meet the chief secretary. Need to work at a high level and not just end up in file pushing. An NGO has to be identified as nodal agency to build a link between NGO and government. We have a sensitive Chief secretary at present and we need to draw his attention towards our policy. People inside the system needs to do the pushing and since we work on the same issue with same perspective we need to come together to institutionalize the Delhi model in convergence mode. In the next three months that we meet we will be in a better position on a number of issues:

• Giving adequate resources to POs
• Institutionalize support to NGOs
• Linkages between DLSA, health department & NGOs
• Everybody take ownership for performance
• Formalize regulation & monitoring system

Protection Officer’s comments

• Even POs should attend sessions in feminist counselors
• We’ve received no orientation by department
• Cases in court going on. There are 4 cases fresh on daily basis and at times we have to go on Sunday to serve notice. In case we are unable to serve notice due to busy schedule we even get surmon from courts and judges do not listen to us.
• We also get notices of NCR – Gurgaon, Noida and Faridabad and we have not be provided any vehicle to go to these places and it is also not safe.
• Metropolitan magistrate not sensitive to POs
• Appearance by POs in different courts at same time
• 1 MM reports to 18 magistrates and it hard for them to reach them simultaneously.
• Magistrate give no respect to POs in front of lawyers in court
• When DCW refers cases they should send the entire report or file to cut down on time.

Some suggestions and recommendations

• Setting up of Help desk on PWDVA at DWCD that is headed by Delhi state co – ordinator on PWDVA, who tries to bring synergy between different stakeholders on the PWDVA and who also prepares monthly, quarterly and annual reports for NCT Delhi

• DLSA needs to appoint one legal aid lawyer with each Magistrate’s court or may be with each PO

• DLSA needs to open a separate cell for PWDVA

• Magistrates need to co-ordinate with Pos and also should get some guidelines from Delhi HC on the PWDVA.

• Trainings for Magistrates, Pos, SPs and police on continuous, sustained and systematic manner

• Service of notice should be done through existing process serving agency of courts or MM should seek police assistance in this regard rather then put the entire burden on Pos.

• Alternatively, members of Mahila Panchayat, Zonal committees can also be delegated this power officially by PO / DWCD

• Delhi High court should establish separate courts to deal with all PWDVA cases.

• DCW should take on the role of nodal monitoring agency.

• All NGOs running Mahila Panchayat in Delhi should be registered as SPS

• One home for DV victims in every district of Delhi to be achieved with NGO – MP and DWCD partnership. (“har mohalla main ek ghar : humein nahi kisi ka dar”- New slogan for the MP network)

THE WAY AHEAD

• Formalization and institutionalization of the Delhi model incorporating prevention and support structures and using all existing machineries in Delhi to work on the PWDVA
• Formation of a small group (core experts group) to meet the chief secretary, Delhi Government and apprising him of the proposal. Following members were suggested:
• Gouri - Action India – Mother NGO (representing MP network)
• Bonani – UNDP
• Sanjay Sharma – DLSA
• Reny Jacob – DCW
• Sudhir Yadav / Asha Thakur – CAWC, Police
• Sharmista Sharma – DWCD
• Reena Banerjee – Navsrhsti
• Bulbul Das – Service provider representative
• One PO
• MM – Secretary of district court DLSA

This delegation can meet with the CS, Delhi Government, Mr Rakesh Mehta and try to give institutional shape to this Delhi Model.