Read The Hindu Notes of 27th April 2019 for UPSC Civil Service Examination, State Civil Service Examination and other competitive Examination

The Hindu Notes for 27th April 2019
  • Topic Discussed: The Hindu Notes of 27th April 2019

    • Lessons from a military encounter

    Why New Delhi and Islamabad must keep lines of communication open at all times

  • Talking to one’s adversary in the midst of a war, a limited war or even hostility is often viewed as undesirable in the public mind. However, the lesson from the long history of warfare and India’s own experience in dealing with past crises is that talking to one’s adversaries is a crucial requirement for de-escalation and for bringing the two sides back from the brink. Such talks are often done discreetly and soberly via the ‘back channel’, away from media attention and focussed on de-escalation, meeting the aims behind the war-talk and achieving an honourable exit from the tussle.
  • In this regard, it is important to ask, how did Indian and Pakistani decision-makers fare in the end-February military encounter that the two sides found themselves in the middle of after the Pulwama terror strike? Going by the information that is currently available in open sources, and conversations with analysts in India and Pakistan, I would say that there were hardly any pre-existing/dedicated channels of communication between the two countries; the ones that were in place were not put to use; and very little bilateral conversation actually took place to de-escalate the crisis. That should be of great concern to us. Therefore, the military stand-off that followed the Indian Air Force strikes on Balakot, in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, should encourage the two sides to urgently put in place dedicated bilateral conflict de-escalation mechanisms, in the absence of which the two nuclear-armed countries could potentially head towards an undesirable, inadvertent and unintended conflict with unpredictable outcomes.
  • It must be kept in mind that there is nothing to guarantee that military crises can be finely calibrated and controlled by central decision-makers — they cannot be. For instance, what would have been the nature of the escalation had the ordnance fired by the Pakistan Air Force actually hit forward military installations such as a Division HQ of the Indian Army in Kashmir and involved casualties?

    • Communication breakdown

  • The conversation at the Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) level, the highest military contact that currently exists between India and Pakistan and which has often played a de-escalatory role, was not activated during the crisis. Unlike previous years, since Pakistan did not have a National Security Adviser (NSA) or an equivalent official, there were no NSA-level talks either. The two High Commissioners, unsurprisingly but disturbingly, were called back to their home countries for consultations. If anything, it is during crisis periods that envoys should stay put in their respective High Commissions to find ways of defusing tensions and relaying messages and options back to their governments. Curiously, India and Pakistan chose to do the exact opposite.
  • More significantly, there were apparently no back-channel contacts between India and Pakistan during the February crisis. During the Kargil conflict, on the other hand, politically appointed interlocutors had conducted discreet discussions on de-escalatory measures between the two sides. For the most part of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) -I and II governments, there was an established mechanism of backchannel conversations by special envoys appointed by the respective Prime Ministers. The current Bharatiya Janata Party-led government decided to discontinue that time-tested and useful practice.
  • Against this background, it was puzzling that none of these tried, tested and somewhat successful mechanisms was used by the two sides. Did the government in New Delhi, for instance, want to keep decision-making and messaging during the crisis too close to its chest to ensure maximum political mileage from it?
  • Given the lack of abundant options for crisis communication, the two sides had to innovate on a war footing. Media reports have suggested that the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chiefs had communicated with each other about what might happen had the Indian pilot not been released by Pakistan, among other things, something the Indian NSA also conveyed to Pakistan via the U.S. Parleys between the intelligence chiefs is an unlikely channel and contacts between them, while useful during crises, would not be able to achieve as much as between politically-empowered interlocutors. In any case, serving spymasters aren’t perhaps best placed for conflict de-escalation.
  • The fact that there were fears in Pakistan that India was preparing to launch missiles at its territory and that the Pakistani concerns about a possible Indian attack have not disappeared in Pakistan also goes to show the poor state of crisis communication between the nuclear rivals.
  • It is not difficult to understand why India chose not to communicate with Pakistan in an effective and officially authorised manner. Doing so would have taken away the political utility of the ‘teaching Pakistan a lesson’ rhetoric: how can India be seen to be talking to Pakistan at any level (except perhaps to threaten) when it is avenging the deaths of its solders? But even such a calculation shouldn’t have prevented India, I would argue, from making high-level de-escalatory contacts with Pakistan, for doing so is nothing but wise statecraft. Not doing so allows domestic political calculations to trump the diktats of statecraft.

    • Too many third parties

  • When the hostile parties do not talk to de-escalate, others tend to step in. February and early March witnessed a slew of efforts by third parties to ensure that India and Pakistan de-escalate from the nuclear brink. The Americans, Chinese, Russians, Saudis, Emiratis were all involved one way or another in defusing the tensions between the two countries. During earlier crises, Washington was the only mediator, but this time around, thanks to the tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan and the rise of other prominent actors in the region, there were several interested parties in the fray, each with its own agenda. Not only does the involvement of several parties make the situation more chaotic, it could potentially lead to more miscommunication and mismanagement.
  • Here’s the problem then. On the one hand, there was very little crisis negotiation between the principal parties to the conflict — India and Pakistan. On the other, there were several third parties who jumped into the fray for mediation, and it seemed as if both the sides were happily outsourcing their crisis management to third parties with differing agendas and motives. Outsourcing conflict management to third parties, especially in the absence of one’s own mechanisms, is a recipe for disaster.

    • Reinstate backchannel talks

  • One of the biggest takeaways from the February crisis is the need to reinstate/re-establish high-level backchannel contacts with interlocutors in Pakistan, whether Islamabad or Rawalpindi. This is a lesson from various India-Pakistan crises, be it the backchannel through the 1999 Kargil conflict and the 2001-2002 crisis, discreet negotiations between the two sides preceding the 2003 ceasefire agreement and the post-Mumbai escalation.
  • This is also a lesson the two Cold War rivals had learnt, that they had to keep talking to each other through the worst years of their rivalry. As a matter of fact, it took the Cuban Missile Crisis to convince the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. to negotiate arms control, discuss crisis management and put in place confidence-building measures, notwithstanding the state of their relationship. Remember, the Cold War also had domestic political implications especially for the U.S., but that didn’t prevent them from instituting conflict-management measures.

    • Competing for the best

    India’s ability to attract global faculty hinges on dramatic changes in its higher education structure

  • The flow of academics, for decades, has been from India to other countries. One can find top Indian talent, for example, at many American universities. They include the dean of the Harvard Business School and the dean of Harvard College, and a number of university presidents as well as professors in many fields. This flow of talent has heavily impacted the availability of highly qualified academics in Indian universities. To counter this “brain drain” and to quickly improve top Indian institutions, the Narendra Modi government introduced flagship programmes such as the Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN), Visiting Advanced Joint Research Faculty Scheme (VAJRA), and Scheme for Promotion of Academic and Research Collaboration (SPARC). It was reported recently that there are just 40 foreign teachers at all of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) — 1% of the total faculty of 5,400 — despite the government’s goal to attract 20% international faculty at higher education institutions such as the IITs. This is despite the fact that internationalisation in general and the appointment of global staff is central to the new ‘Institutions of Eminence’ programme. The goal is even more lofty after the IIT Council, last year, recommended the recruitment of foreign faculty on a tenure basis. The Graded Autonomy Regulations of the University Grants Commission also now allows the highest performing universities to hire up to 20% foreign faculty on tenure basis.
  • It is virtually impossible for India to attract large numbers of international professors of high standing and ability without dramatic changes in many aspects of the existing governance structure in higher education. Dramatically enhanced funding would also be required.

    • The talent pool

  • There are two kinds of international academics to be considered. The first category is accomplished senior professors — these would be very difficult to lure to India. Established in their careers, with attractive international salaries, and often with family and other obligations, they are embedded both in their universities and locales. The other group are younger scholars who may have fewer ties to universities and societies, and are thus more mobile. Further, some, depending on their disciplines, may have difficulty in locating a permanent academic job at home due to a tight academic job market. They also will not add to the immediate prestige of the Indian university which hires them since they do not have an established reputation. However, they can provide quality teaching, research and they often bring a useful international perspective.
  • The main possibilities for mobility are academics of Indian origin (non-resident Indians) who have successful careers abroad and who might be attracted back. The major recent initiative of the Indian government, GIAN, has been successful in attracting many academics of Indian origin from different countries for shorter durations. However, the experiences of two prominent universities sponsored by Indian and other regional governments — the South Asian University in Delhi and Nalanda in Bihar — show that offering higher salaries with exemption from taxation has not been very successful in attracting senior faculty of foreign origin.
  • In some ways, the best Indian universities would require a kind of “cultural revolution” to join the ranks of global world-class universities — and to be able to lure top faculty. The structural and practical realities of Indian universities make them generally unattractive to academic talent from abroad. A few examples indicate some of the challenges.

    • Scales of salary

  • Indian academic salaries are not globally competitive, even taking into account variations in living costs. In the U.S., senior academics at research universities typically earn around ₹8,970,000 and up annually, and those at top universities can earn ₹13,800,000 or more. The average salary for a full-time academic is ₹5,037,000, with those in high demand fields in the sciences, business and others earning significantly more. In comparison, the total emoluments offered to a professor in an IIT located in one of the Indian metro cities, in accordance with the latest Pay Commission’s minimum pay scale with house rent allowance is around ₹2,640,000. China, which is also actively luring top international faculty to its research universities, is offering salaries of ₹6,900,000 or more along with additional research funding.
  • International faculty cannot be offered long-term appointments in Indian public institutions. A five-year contract is all that is available. Thus, there is little job security.
  • Obtaining research funding is difficult and the resources available, by international standards, are quite limited.
  • On the other hand, a few ‘elite’ private universities such as O.P. Jindal, Azim Premji, Ashoka, Shiv Nadar, Ahmedabad, Krea, and the management institute Indian School of Business have adopted different strategies; for instance, ranging from attracting foreign nationals, to Indians who studied at prestigious foreign universities to their institutions by offering higher salaries and other benefits than are available to local hires. The faculty diversity of O.P. Jindal Global University, for example, stands out among these with 71 full-time foreign faculty from 32 countries. The key motivation for hiring foreign faculty at all these institutions is to improve international competitiveness and secure positions in global rankings, which in turn would also attract more motivated students.
  • These new private institutions with, by Indian standards, considerable resources have proved that it is possible to attract foreign faculty, at least those with an Indian ethnic background. But the challenges faced by public institutions, even those of as high quality as the IITs and the best universities, seem insurmountable, at least in the context of the current Indian higher education environment and bureaucratic and legal framework.

    • Backstop option

    Brexit modalities are putting pressure on the fragile peace in Northern Ireland

  • Journalist Lyra McKee’s gruesome murder in Londonderry last week has brought into focus the fragile Irish peace process, more than 20 years after Britain and Ireland signed the historic Good Friday accord. The attack, carried out by the so-called New IRA, opposed to the 1998 deal, also underscores the political stalemate following the collapse of power-sharing institutions in Northern Ireland. McKee, 29, a freelance journalist and author, rose to prominence through her work on the victims of three decades of The Troubles. In March, authorities held the New IRA, established in 2012, responsible for sending parcel bombs to transport hubs in London and a university in Scotland. In January, it owned up a car bomb explosion at a Londonderry court, a sign of renewed militant activity, soon after the U.K. Parliament rejected the government’s withdrawal deal from the EU over disagreements on the border with the Republic of Ireland. The so-called Irish backstop is designed to ensure – until an alternative is found – that Britain remains in a customs union with the EU, so as to protect the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The absence of customs checkpoints in the region over two decades has been critical to protecting the peace, and maintaining the status quo is a paramount demand notwithstanding Britain’s eventual exit from the EU. But champions of a hard Brexit are hostile to the backstop, which they fear will tie Britain permanently in a customs union and deny London the freedom to strike trade agreements with third countries. The issue has divided Dublin and London, as also the Leave and Remain camps within Britain’s principal political parties.
  • Meanwhile, the Northern Ireland Assembly, responsible for the exercise of devolved authority in the region, has remained in suspended animation since 2017. Northern Ireland’s two main parties, the pro-British Democratic Unionist Party and the Sinn Féin, the Irish republican party, are divided on several issues of governance. This has lent credence to the view that the 1998 accord has merely managed sectarian divisions rather than cement relations between communities. The DUP, which props up the Conservative government in London, has consistently opposed the backstop, despite the promise it holds to protect the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. But the party could yet play a constructive part in breaking the Brexit stalemate by backing Prime Minister Theresa May’s withdrawal agreement. This prospect has gained strength following the Conservative hardliners’ suggestion that they could support Ms. May’s deal if the DUP were also to come on board. A meeting of minds on this question would save the U.K. from the grave danger of crashing out of the EU without an agreement. It would equally guarantee peace in Northern Ireland.

    • Parallel probes

    According priority to inquiry into the sexual harassment complaint is a welcome move

  • It is reassuring that there will be no parallel inquiries into the two sets of allegations that have rocked the Supreme Court. Justice (retired) A.K. Patnaik, who has been tasked with probing an alleged conspiracy against the Chief Justice of India, has made the right decision by choosing to wait for the end of the in-house inquiry into a former woman employee’s complaint of sexual harassment by the CJI and subsequent victimisation, before starting his work. The court constituted two inquiries to deal with the situation following the complaint against the CJI. A three-judge Bench, passing orders on a matter concerning the independence of the judiciary, appointed Justice Patnaik to investigate the affidavits filed by Utsav Singh Bains, an advocate, who has alleged a larger conspiracy against the CJI involving disgruntled court employees and other ‘fixers’. On the administrative side, an in-house committee headed by Justice S.A. Bobde will look into the complaint of the dismissed woman court assistant. The Bench emphasised that the probe into the alleged plot would not impinge on the harassment complaint. However, it was obvious that it would not be possible for such parallel proceedings to be independent of each other. Mr. Bains has alleged he was offered up to ₹1.50 crore by someone to file a false complaint against the CJI. It would have been well nigh impossible to verify the claim without examining if the intermediaries had any nexus with the complainant.
  • Clearly, the complaint of sexual harassment should get priority. It is only if the complaint is found to be false that there will be a case to probe whether it was part of a plot to malign the CJI, or a conspiracy. It is unfortunate that the composition of the in-house committee became a controversy. There was concern that there was only one woman member, and the complainant raised the issue of the proximity of one of its members, Justice N.V. Ramana, with the CJI. He has now recused himself to make way for another woman judge. The episode has highlighted the lacuna in the in-house procedure the judges have adopted. There is no provision to deal with a situation where the CJI is the subject of a complaint. Also, the idea of the inquiry being wholly ‘in-house’ is in conflict with the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, which envisages the presence of an external member. Despite this shortcoming, the committee should try to ensure a fair hearing for the former employee. The dignity and institutional integrity of the judiciary will be better served by probing the veracity of her charge, rather than by pursuing evidence for sweeping claims that “the rich and the powerful” are trying to run the courts.

    • The long wait for safety

    A year after the launch of the Safe Cities programme, not much headway has been made in making cities safer for women. Jagriti Chandra and Hemani Bhandari report how late disbursal of funds and election time restrictions have slowed down the whole process

    Long wait for safety
  • Anchal Yadav, 18, finds the daily one hour commute by share autorickshaw to her college in Lucknow familiar, yet daunting. Every day, the rickshaw is chock-a-block with passengers. Anchal curls into a ball, using her arms to protect herself from any unwelcome touch, and keeps her bag on her lap. When she returns home in the afternoon from college, Anchal says she is wary of walking down the deserted street near her house. Public transport is poor in Uttar Pradesh’s capital. For women like Anchal, the autorickshaw is the best mode of transport and often the only one. Going to college is not just a routine, it is an exercise in staying alert — every day, all the time.
  • Down south, in Bengaluru, Jyothi Ramesh, 20, is equally familiar with this exhaustion. She says the journey late evening to the nearest bus stop from the factory where she works is nerve-racking. She is thankful to have found a colleague who goes in the same direction and often rides with her.
  • Traversing India’s cities is not just difficult for college girls and working women, but also for policewomen. Sheetal, 21, is a young woman in khaki. A constable with the Delhi police, she works night shifts. As part of the Police Control Room (PCR) unit, she is among the first responders to crimes in her area. Yet, Sheetal’s parents cannot stop worrying about her safety when she travels to and from work. Her phone buzzes through the night with calls from home. She puts her mobile phone on silent mode, as taking personal calls on duty is frowned upon.

    • A watershed moment

  • Following the horrific gang rape of a young woman in a moving bus in New Delhi in December 2012 and the public outcry that followed it, the United Progressive Alliance-2 government set up the Nirbhaya Fund, named after the victim as she was referred to by the media, to ensure the safety of women across the country, with an initial corpus of ₹1,000 crore. The fund was announced at the fag end of that government’s term, and so little was spent from it. Over six years, the amount increased to ₹3,600 crore, but reports emerged that the money was not being used. Faced with severe criticism for this, the National Democratic Alliance government approved in March 2018 ₹2,919 crore from this corpus for the Safe Cities programme for eight major cities — Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Lucknow — for three years. The Centre and the States share the expenses for the scheme (60:40). The amount given by the Central government is ₹2,016.50 crore.
  • The Centre invited proposals from the Director Generals of Police (DGP) of these eight cities as well as from Municipal Commissioners. The Hindu tracked the status of implementation of the Safe Cities programme in six of the eight cities and found that not a single penny had been spent by the local administrations despite funds being released by the Centre. The police in many cities said that tendering for works proposed by them under the programme (such as installation of CCTV cameras, PCR vans, e-toilets and pink patrol bikes and cars) will begin only after the Lok Sabha election is over. In Delhi, senior officials drew a blank when asked about the execution of the scheme.
  • Public pressure forced both the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress to give more primacy to women’s safety in their 2014 manifestos, but that is not the case this time. Despite the BJP’s ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ scheme, which aims to “prevent gender-biased sex selective elimination, ensure survival and protection of the girl child, and ensure education of girls”, and the Congress’s plan to develop a Citizens’ Charter for Women’s Safety and Security, the promise to fight against gender violence is drowned in the din of claims and counter-claims by political parties this election season. Further, it is clear that both the BJP and the Congress look at women’s safety only through the prism of criminal investigation — the BJP talks about ‘forensic facilities’ and ‘fast-track courts’, and the Congress proposes a ‘separate investigative agency’ for heinous crimes against women. The focus on making public spaces safe and accessible for women like Anchal, Jyothi and Sheetal through sustained campaigns is entirely absent.

    • In Lucknow, call helpline 1090

  • It is 4 p.m. and the control room in Lucknow is abuzz with the sounds of ceaseless typing, phones ringing, and calls being answered. Women police constables wearing headphones lend a patient ear to complaints from women on the other end of the line, type out complaints, and submit them online for further action.
  • The call centre is not far from the U.P. Police Headquarters. The ‘Women Power Helpline 1090’ was launched to ensure that police help is only a phone call away. Victims don’t need to go to the police station to file a complaint. The requirement to file an FIR, too, has been dispensed with in order to encourage women to break their silence without fear of reprisal, often from their own families.
  • As many as 45 women constables have been tasked with answering complaints about lewd phone calls, online abuse, stalking and sexual harassment. The helpline, which was launched in 2012, registers about 730 complaints a day. Once a complaint is filed, a male constable calls the offender and rebukes him for his misdemeanour, warns him of police action and, in rare cases when this is insufficient, books him for a crime. The grievance is considered resolved only after following up with the victim over 45 days.
  • “We tell the offender that he is being put on the police radar; that if he doesn’t change, there will be legal action. So, it is both reformatory and punitive. But when there are incidents that require immediate action, say a case of rape, we lodge an FIR immediately,” says Uttar Pradesh Director General of Police O.P. Singh.
  • The data collected from calls made to the helpline offer an insight into the State. The most number of complaints come from Lucknow, Kanpur, Prayagraj, Varanasi and Gorakhpur. Data from 2018 show that 53% of women who called the helpline were non-working women. Thirty-four per cent of the calls came from college students. More than 70% of the complaints were about lewd phone calls. Incidents of cyber-harassment increased by four times in 2018 from the previous year.
  • The U.P. police plans to double the capability of this unique initiative under the Safe Cities programme and add 40 more computer terminals, says Singh. The Central government has approved ₹194 crore for Lucknow from the Nirbhaya Fund. Proposals also include integrating 1090 with another helpline, UP 100 (the Uttar Pradesh Police Emergency Management System); setting up an integrated control room linked to 1,500 CCTVs; pink outposts for facilitating easy filing of complaints by women; 100 pink patrol scooters, 100 pink SUVs, 74 pink toilets, and public transport buses that are GPS-enabled and equipped with panic buttons and CCTV cameras. A Data Analytics centre at the 1090 call centre has also been proposed. Singh says the Centre disbursed the entire sum in three tranches by January, but work on these projects will commence only some time this year. He says the 1090 helpline and other measures have helped the U.P. police combat crimes against women, and that there was a 7% fall in rape cases in 2018 from 2017.
  • Richa Rastogi, a local women’s rights activist, voices concern over these insular efforts, however. She points to the need to look at women’s safety beyond violent crimes in public spaces. “A safe city must have provisions for shelter homes for women who have escaped from violent marriages and sometimes from their own parents who want to get them married without their consent. There is also a need to deploy protection officers mandated under the Domestic Violence Act,” says Rastogi who works with Humsafar, an NGO supporting survivors of gender-based violence. She adds that an earlier initiative to introduce pink autos in the city failed as they were mostly operated and used by men. “We need to have women drivers. This will ensure women’s empowerment and make women commuters feel safe,” she says.

    • Women cops in the capital city

  • It’s 10 p.m. on a Saturday in the capital city. Sheetal, Manisha and Sarika (names changed), all constables, are circling New Delhi’s Connaught Place in a PCR van. They have a 12-hour shift. Their task is to be the first responders to calls made to the police in the area. They often intervene in drunken brawls, rescue intoxicated men lying on the streets, and sometimes face the ire of victims of theft.
  • They may be with the police, but their parents worry about their safety as they travel long distances from their homes on the outskirts of the city to report for work. “We travel alone, often at night. Though we are police officers, parents will always be parents. Sometimes, I get calls every half an hour on my way home,” says Manisha, who lives in Haryana’s Bahadurgarh. Manisha takes two buses, a metro and an autorickshaw to reach work.
  • Although these women have heard stories of discrimination by their male counterparts, they haven’t had any unpleasant encounters since they joined the force in February, they say. “We have had meetings in which we have been told that we can inform our seniors or any officer in case someone misbehaves with us,” says Sarika.
  • The city police says its women officers patrol outside schools and colleges to ensure that women students are safe. “All the Station House Officers are directed to increase patrolling in winter as the streets are more lonely then and visibility is low. Police booths and facilitation desks are also provided at identifiable places in crowded areas,” says Geeta Rani Verma, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Special Police Unit for Women and Children).
  • The Delhi police was sanctioned ₹663.67 crore under the scheme. It was also the only city to receive 100% funding from the Centre. The Delhi police plans to procure hi-tech ‘field devices’ for enhanced real-time responses to crimes in the city; have dedicated women safety patrol vans equipped with dashboards for viewing live feeds from CCTV cameras across the city; and GPS tracking facilities. However, despite the scheme being approved more than a year ago, a senior official seems to know little about it.

    • Plans afoot in Chennai

  • Rajalakshmi, a working woman who frequently travels on the Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) between Chepauk and Velachery in Chennai, says it is unsafe to travel in the city late in the day. The MRTS stations are sprawling, dark, unutilised spaces. “It is an ordeal to reach the platform. I have to cross empty, dark spaces inside the station to reach it. A policeman or a security guard in the station is a rare sight. I know of women who are frequently harassed on running trains and in dark corners of the stations too,” she says. Rajalakshmi’s fear is not unfounded. In 2016, Chennai was gripped by horror when a 24-year-old Infosys employee was hacked to death at a busy railway station in broad daylight. In January this year, a woman was molested at the Taramani MRTS station by railway staff.
  • The Chennai Corporation and police have an elaborate plan to augment the infrastructure in the city to ensure safety of women. The local body plans to have 617 ‘safe zone clusters’ in places considered crime hotspots and where surveillance cameras and street lights are to be installed. These safe clusters will cover 19 bus stands, 10 colleges, 70 schools, seven shopping malls, seven IT parks and 56 railway stations as well as markets and places of worship. As many as 500 e-toilets for women are to be set up in public places and 30 mobile toilets for women police staff on bandobust duty at the cost of ₹27.77 crore. The city police also plans to conduct a GIS-based heat map of areas of crime against women that is to be integrated with notification services on mobile applications. A 24x7 emergency app to track women in distress and a helpline service for women are on the cards, officials claim. The total amount sanctioned to the city under the Safe Cities project is ₹426 crore.
  • But all these are only on paper.
  • “Once the elections are over, we will call for tenders,” says an official on the condition of anonymity.

    • SHE teams in Hyderabad

  • Among the initiatives Hyderabad has already undertaken to ensure that women are safe, the police counts its SHE teams as a success. The aim of the SHE teams is to curb ‘eveteasing’ in all aspects and in all places. In the last four and a half years, the SHE teams in Hyderabad have received 12,000 petitions. But these teams mostly have male officers.
  • Speaking of how complaints reach them, Shikha Goel, Additional Commissioner of Police (Crimes and SIT), Hyderabad, says women use social media often nowadays. “They trust this medium and we respond promptly,” she says.
  • But SHE teams are not the only answer. Seven months after the Centre allocated ₹282 crore from the Nirbhaya Fund to the city administration under the Safe Cities programme, the money lies unused. A senior police officer says that in October 2018, the Centre released its share of ₹112.8 crore, but the 40% share from the State government has not come yet. “Once the funds are released from the State government, we will work on various projects related to women’s safety, including the installation of CCTV cameras at hotspots and in public transport,” the officer says.

    • Eyes on the street

  • The Bengaluru police launched pink Hoysalas, or patrolling vehicles, to exclusively address women and child safety issues. But Dona Fernandes of Vimochana, a women’s rights organisation, says that these pink Hoysalas are often used for other policing jobs. Although this was started as a service that would have exclusive women patrolling staff, many of the Hoysalas are run by male police personnel, she says.
  • The City Police Commissioner, T. Suneel Kumar, says that a ₹667 crore proposal for the Safe Cities programme is yet to be implemented. “The Karnataka government has received funds from the Central government, but we will carry out the project once the code of conduct for the elections comes to an end,” he says.
  • The Centre allocated ₹252 crore to Mumbai for the Safe Cities programme and the Maharashtra Cabinet approved the installation of 1,600 CCTV cameras across the metropolis. Senior officials say they have so far not submitted a single bill to the Centre under the scheme and it would take at least another two months for work to begin.
  • While the plan to place Mumbai under the watch of a CCTV network had been in the works for several years, the project was made fully functional only in 2016, with Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis inaugurating 4,717 cameras covering 1,510 spots in the city. The feed from the cameras is viewed in real time at the Mumbai Police Control Room, enabling the police to keep an eye on law and order. The same feed is also beamed live to offices of senior officers like the Commissioner of Police and the Joint Commissioner of Police (Law and Order).

    • Beyond technology

  • But is safety merely about having more eyes on the streets?
  • “An overemphasis on technology and policing will enhance security, but not necessarily make cities safer for women or enhance their access to public spaces,” says Kalpana Viswanath, co-founder of Safetipin, a mobile app that provides safety scores of different localities to its users. Viswanath is among the members of the committee headed by the Home Secretary to guide the formulation of the Safe Cities programme. She is also the chairperson of Jagori, an NGO that conducted a safety audit of Delhi in 2005-06. The study highlighted threats to women’s safety such as poor lighting in public spaces and broken pavements that force women to walk on the roads and render them vulnerable to verbal and sexual abuse by men on bikes and in cars. The audit also pointed out how women felt safer in areas that were populated by hawkers and vegetable-sellers late in the evening.
  • “Besides policing, we need to look at urban planning and designing gender-friendly spaces. We need to effect a change in cultural and social norms through campaigns. I am really surprised that none of these cities wants to spend money on a campaign,” she says. “Globally, wherever cities have made significant changes, it has been because of the municipal authorities. Whether it is New York, London, Bogota, or Seoul, it is because the mayoral system has been strengthened. For cities we must ask for stronger local bodies.”
  • Conversations with police officials across cities show that it is not only the State authorities, but also the civic authorities who have a role to play in securing the safety of women in public places.