GUWAHATI, July 18 � The mindset of the society needs to be changed and a combined effort of the society is needed to bring an end to the July 9 GS Road-type incidents of crime against women. The incident put the entire nation to shame and all the culprits involved in the crime should be brought to book and punished according to law.
This was the opinion expressed by Mamta Sharma, chairperson of the National Commission for Women (NCW) while addressing the mediapersons here this afternoon after meeting the Chief Minister at his Assembly chamber.
She said assertively that the NCW will not sit idle until justice is delivered in the July 9 case. She refused to accept the July 9 incident as a mere law-and-order matter. Rather it was due to public apathy that the incident could happen. Yes, police was 45-minute late in arriving at the spot. But the people there played with the dignity of a woman, she said.
Denying that she had ever made any comment on the Indian girls wearing western clothes, she said that if someone makes such a statement even after 64 years of independence one has the right to wonder as to whether �we are for making our girls prisoners.�
The July 9 GS Road incident of molestation of a girl has shocked the entire country and traumatized the parents of the girls, she said.
She thanked the media for its role in connection with the incident and urged it to be positive in its approach in all such cases.
She clarified that Alaka Lamba was not a member of the NCW. She was a member of the fact-finding committee set up by the NCW in connection with the July 9 incident. The fact-finding committee was useful for the NCW, she said.
She said that she was ready to meet Laxmi Orang, who was molested by a crowd in the Beltola area of the city in an incident in 2007 and would even go for reviving her case if the situation so demands.
She also informed that she was trying to meet the victim of the July 9 incident, besides the Chief Secretary (CS) and the Director General of the State�s Police (DGP).
The NCW chairperson said that she was not ready to accept Assam as the number one State for crime against women. It is not even the number two State in this respect, she said.
NCW member Nirmala Sawant who accompanied her, said, that they were here to meet the Chief Minister, CS and the DGP and to ask them to complete the case within a time frame.
According to the State Women Commission chairperson Meera Baruah, the NCW chairperson met the victim of the July 9 incident, the Chief Secretary and the DGP before leaving for Delhi this afternoon.
