‘The rights of women are also human rights’

BHUBANESWAR: “The role of Government and the intervention of media, to create awareness among the women and highlight the issues about the domestic violence act, are very important. Government should give stress on the post-implementation of the Act,” said the secretary of Friends’ Association for Rural Reconstruction (FARR) Pramila Swain in a press meet on ‘International campaign fortnight to combat violence against women’ here on Friday.

International campaign fortnight or the 16 days of activism against gender violence is an international campaign. The campaign period starts from November 25 which is International day against violence against women and ends with December 10- International Human Rights Day. The campaign emphasizes that violence against women is violation of human rights. It says about strengthening local work around violence against women, demonstrating the solidarity of women around the world against violence against women, creating tools to pressure governments to implement promises made to eliminate violence against women and at last to create awareness from the grassroots level to the world level.

The veteran social activists of the State opined, ‘The rights of women are also human rights’ in the press meet organized by Civil Society Resource Facility (CSRF) supported by Oxfam India. They said that nearly 164 countries have been participating in the 16 days campaign since 1991.

The themes of this year are bringing together women, peace, and human rights movements to challenge militarism, proliferation of small arms and their role in domestic violence, sexual violence in and after conflict, political violence against women, sexual and gender-based violence committed by state agents, particularly the police or military. The organization appealed to the media to highlight the women related issues particularly regarding violence against women.

“All districts are facing the problem in implementation due to dual responsibility of protection officers, lack of synergy among stakeholders like protection officers, the court the court and service providers, service of notice within 3 days, lack of awareness about the act on a massive scale etc.”, said secretary Pramila while inaugurating the press meet. 

A veteran activist and State coordinator of NAWO said the administration is becoming person centric as development initiatives are being taken within a particular person’s period, if the person has interest on the field which is not a healthy trend. It should be system centric, where any officer who comes will work on the problems raised by women.