We want justice, We won’t surrender!
Posted on December 17, 2018
December 16th, Gandhi Bhavan, Bangalore
Marking the 6th Anniversary of Nirbhaya’s incident on 16th December, 2018 and several other stirring incidents of sexual assault on women and children across Karnataka, specially the brutal rape of a 7 year old child in Mandya district, People’s Movement against Sexual Assault (PMASA), a coalition of grassroots movements, activists, community leaders, lawyers, academics and concerned individuals dedicated to end sexual violence and fight for gender equality, convened a ‘Women’s Court’ to hear stories of people’s struggle against sexual assault across the state of Karnataka. Kavita Ratna, Director – Advocacy of The Concerned for Working Children was one of the members of the jury of eminent activists and experts in the field, who were present at the hearing. A report titled ‘We won’t surrender’: A study that looks at 30 cases of sexual assault on women and children, was released at the event.
One of the residents of Namma Bhoomi and presently a staff member of The Concerned for Working Children, shared her hard hitting story of how she was unsuccessful in her attempts of seeking justice, even though having approached the offices of the Prime Minister and Chief Minister, along with the offices of the concerned departments. Ms. Kavita Ratna, as a member of the jury, shared how in the Nirbhaya case, the movement was converted as a conflict between children’s rights and women’s rights movements, which resulted in a highly regressive amendment to the Juvenile Justice Act in 2015. She urged that both the women’s rights and children’s rights movements have to collaborate to expose and reform the failures in the system affecting both women and children. She also recalled how POCSO Act has often been misused rather than used to uphold children’s rights. She called for the need to approach these challenges not in a reactive mode but in an agenda setting mode based on a larger vision for justice.
CWC will now be part of the core committee which will be submitting its recommendations to the Department of Women and Child Development, Government of Karnataka to ensure speedy justice in the cases that have been discussed in the report.
Press Coverage of the Event:
Prajavani: Women’s Court: Relief for the Aggrieved
