On the eve of International Women’s Day, Lawyers Collective released its latest publication titled, ‘Learning & Sharing Manual on Violence against Women’.The publication was released yesterday at an event in New Delhi, with the Supreme Court’s Justice Dipak Misra the Chief Guest..Apart from Justice Misra, other noteable attendees at the launch were Senior Advocates Fali S Nariman, Indira Jaising and Raju Ramachandran, Justice (Retd) Manju Goel, and the Acting British High Commissioner to India Dr. Alexander Evans Obe..Justice Dipak Misra, Jaising and Obe addressed the myriad gathering of journalists, policy research analysts and law students, while Nariman & Ramachandran chose to be silent spectators, smiling at the witty anecdotes shared by the speakers..Taking the podium after releasing the Manual, Justice Dipak Misra spoke about the need for female survivors of any kind of violence to engage with the authorities so as to ensure that similar crimes are brought to light. He also stressed on the different kinds of violence that existed and how none of it is acceptable..“Violence can be mental, physical or even aphysical. The stage has now come where the society must make people aware that there should be no kind of violence; not even the violence of indifference.”.Justice Misra also discussed a recent judgment of the Supreme Court passed in the background of an application filed by a woman alleging that her husband had breached her trust by misappropriating stridhan. The High Court dismissed her application on the grounds that she ought to have approached the Court through a prosecutor. Elaborating on the social justice functions performed by the Supreme Court, Justice Misra said,.“We held [in that case] that the Court can take suo-moto cognizance of such an issue and she can fight for her own rights, without going through the public prosecutor.”.Indira Jaising spoke about the the role of the prosecution and how it should not bear the ‘sole responsibility’ of voicing out the grievances of the survivors..“The Nirbhaya incident not just shocked all of us but managed to change something within us, for the better. With the combined efforts of many people, the Nirbhaya fund has now risen to nearly 2,000 crore rupees. .However, it took our intervention for the Supreme Court to ask the Union as to why was this money sitting idle. Now through this fund we have managed to establish welfare centres from women and children, in a lot of parts in the country.”.Jaising also told the audience about steps being taken to identify space in each district court of Delhi, for a ‘one-stop crisis centre’ where any prosecutor/public spirited individual who wished to meet a survivor could seek to engaged with her..Dr Evans, while admitting that he was ‘uniquely unqualified speaker’ for the evening for he was neither a lawyer and nor did he know much about violence, evoked the maximum laughs from the audience. He re-affirmed the commitment of the British Commission to support the initiative by Lawyers Collective..All the participants at the event were provided with copies of two other publications by the organization, “Locating the Survivor in the Indian Criminal Justice System: Decoding the Law” and “Engaging with the Criminal Justice System: A Guide for Survivors of Sexual Violence.”
On the eve of International Women’s Day, Lawyers Collective released its latest publication titled, ‘Learning & Sharing Manual on Violence against Women’.The publication was released yesterday at an event in New Delhi, with the Supreme Court’s Justice Dipak Misra the Chief Guest..Apart from Justice Misra, other noteable attendees at the launch were Senior Advocates Fali S Nariman, Indira Jaising and Raju Ramachandran, Justice (Retd) Manju Goel, and the Acting British High Commissioner to India Dr. Alexander Evans Obe..Justice Dipak Misra, Jaising and Obe addressed the myriad gathering of journalists, policy research analysts and law students, while Nariman & Ramachandran chose to be silent spectators, smiling at the witty anecdotes shared by the speakers..Taking the podium after releasing the Manual, Justice Dipak Misra spoke about the need for female survivors of any kind of violence to engage with the authorities so as to ensure that similar crimes are brought to light. He also stressed on the different kinds of violence that existed and how none of it is acceptable..“Violence can be mental, physical or even aphysical. The stage has now come where the society must make people aware that there should be no kind of violence; not even the violence of indifference.”.Justice Misra also discussed a recent judgment of the Supreme Court passed in the background of an application filed by a woman alleging that her husband had breached her trust by misappropriating stridhan. The High Court dismissed her application on the grounds that she ought to have approached the Court through a prosecutor. Elaborating on the social justice functions performed by the Supreme Court, Justice Misra said,.“We held [in that case] that the Court can take suo-moto cognizance of such an issue and she can fight for her own rights, without going through the public prosecutor.”.Indira Jaising spoke about the the role of the prosecution and how it should not bear the ‘sole responsibility’ of voicing out the grievances of the survivors..“The Nirbhaya incident not just shocked all of us but managed to change something within us, for the better. With the combined efforts of many people, the Nirbhaya fund has now risen to nearly 2,000 crore rupees. .However, it took our intervention for the Supreme Court to ask the Union as to why was this money sitting idle. Now through this fund we have managed to establish welfare centres from women and children, in a lot of parts in the country.”.Jaising also told the audience about steps being taken to identify space in each district court of Delhi, for a ‘one-stop crisis centre’ where any prosecutor/public spirited individual who wished to meet a survivor could seek to engaged with her..Dr Evans, while admitting that he was ‘uniquely unqualified speaker’ for the evening for he was neither a lawyer and nor did he know much about violence, evoked the maximum laughs from the audience. He re-affirmed the commitment of the British Commission to support the initiative by Lawyers Collective..All the participants at the event were provided with copies of two other publications by the organization, “Locating the Survivor in the Indian Criminal Justice System: Decoding the Law” and “Engaging with the Criminal Justice System: A Guide for Survivors of Sexual Violence.”
