Stree Shakti: WCD in the US : Deliberations on the Issue of Crime Against Women

Wednesday 10 April 2013

WCD in the US : Deliberations on the Issue of Crime Against Women

The importance and dire need of women safety globally

In the spate of rising incidents of violence being reported against women, the government is taking making a number of measures to address the issue so as to increase the safety, and security of women. The effort is now increasingly towards holistic intervention with a view to balance both preventive and curative aspects, including a thrust on proper and effective implementation of various laws and provisions available for safety of girls/women .

The recently held 57th Session of the UN Commission on Status of Women in New York from March 4^th-15^th, 2013 served as an important platform for the world leaders, administrators and experts to deliberate on the issue since elimination and prevention of all forms of violence against women and girls was the theme of this year’s discussion. The occasion gave an opportunity to the Indian delegation led by Minister, WCD, Ms Krishna Tirath, who was accompanied by Ms Rashmi Singh, Executive Director, National Mission for Empowerment of Women, and Joint Secretary ( NMEW), Ms Preeti Madaan to highlight what India has recently done on the issue and also share the various women empowerment and child development initiatives in India. The deliberations led to an agreed conclusion by the member states during the 2^nd week in which Ms Ratna Prabha, Additional Secretary & MD, NMEW, and Ms Indira Jaising, Additional Solicitor General took part in the negotiation rounds with the member states.

168 countries including more than 70 ministers participated in the plenary meeting. They were also joined by non- governmental organizations, think tanks and other civic society members.

WCD minister Krishna Tirath, delivered country’s statement during the discussion highlighting the measures taken in the spate of the recent incident of horrific rape, commonly known as the ‘ Nirbhay’ case.She briefed the gathering about the latest laws passed by the government like the Prevention of Sexual Harassment of Women at workplace, 2013 and protection of children from sexual offences Act 2012. She explained how the two laws, and the amendment in the Criminal Procedure Act underway will bring more stringent punishments to the perpetrators of violence against women and children. The measures related to development of protocols for police, medical functionaries, and other service providers to improve coordination of response to victims of violence, plan of setting up of One Stop Crisis Centers for Women in hundred identified critical districts with the aim to provide integrated services required by women subjected to violence was also shared. Minister, WCD shared the concept of Ahimsa Messengers (peace messengers), Saksham scheme, and the enhanced allocations in the budget 2013-14 for women.

A number of side events were organized by different NGOs on the occasion too. In some of these, members from the Indian delegation were invited to make presentations on thematic issues connected with the focus area of the CSW. There was consensus of in all the deliberations that there is a need to work towards empowerment of women economically and socially. Woman should be strong enough to question the gender stereotypes, and the relevance of deeply held beliefs and social attitudes towards sexes and sexual identities.

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Rashmi Singh

Rashmi Singh is a public servant who has created a distinguished track record for her innovative works in human services, governance reforms and woman empowerment. She was the founder Director of Mission Convergence programme and Samajik Suvidha Sangam in Delhi and was instrumental in laying the foundations, structures and processes which define this unique programme. Her key endeavors through this Mission were to redefine social policy on the basis of new criteria for poverty identification in terms of vulnerability, aligning government policies and delivery mechanisms to reach out to these vulnerable, and building effective GO-NGO partnerships at the grassroots. She is currently working as the Executive Director in the National Mission for Empowerment of Women, Ministry of WCD, Government of India.

Rashmi has provided leadership to the innovative public private partnership program called ‘Stree Shakti’ for the women of low-income groups by steering this programme in Delhi in the years 2004-2007. Under this she institutionalized the Gender Resource Centres as one-stop information cum facilitation center for marginalized women and their families, providing an integrated and holistic empowerment framework benefitting women living in jhuggi-jhopries, slums, resettlement colonies who had little access to development programmes earlier.

Rashmi facilitated the development and adoption of a new criteria and process of defining and identifying the poor. This criteria uses proxy indicators of income based on spatial, social and occupational vulnerability. Widows, single deserted women, and female headed households (FHH) amongst others fall in this vulnerable section. Using this criteria, Ms Singh conducted a unique exercise of mobilizing more than 100 NGOs to undertake a survey of the poor and the marginalized sections of Delhi, living in slums unauthorized colonies, resettlement colonies, and those on the streets. This criteria and methodology of its implementation on ground has been widely recognized by other significant platforms such as ministry of rural development and planning commission.

Rashmi has contributed significantly towards developing systems for introducing transparency, accountability and rights based framework. Through Mission Convergence initiative, she could make significant headway in bringing various existing social security/ benefit schemes of the different departments under unified delivery systems, fostering mechanisms for vertical and horizontal integration in the government, and effective community outreach, especially for reaching out to the unreached i.e. the most marginalized and vulnerable groups.

She has also served as Director, Welfare in the New Delhi Municipal Council from 1999-2004.

Recognitions accorded:

· In 2006 led Stree Shakti to Silver Award at the Commonwealth Association for Public Administration & Management ( CAPAM) in 2006.

· Women of Excellence Award by the FICCI Ladies organization

· In 2010, 2nd ‘Adhi Abadi Award’ for women achievers by Invitca media

· In 2010, the Devi Ahilya Bai Holkar Award, Stree-Shakti award instituted by the Ministry of WCD, Govt of India was conferred upon her by the President of India in recognition of her services in the area of Women’s Empowerment.

· In 2010 won the Award of Excellence in Innovations in Government Services and Programmes and the overall Gold Medal across four awards categories at the Commonwealth Association for Public Administration & Management for Mission Convergence.

· Dr. Sadhna International Empowerment Award, 2011

· In 2011 was conferred the distinguished leadership award for internationals by the University of Minnesota in USA

Educational Qualification

· University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, Master of Public Affairs, 2007. Major in Management and Governance of Non-Profits.

· I.H.S, Erasmus University, Netherlands. Post graduate Diploma, July-Sept, 2004. Topic of Study: ‘Policies on Poverty Reduction and Local Economic Development’.

· University of Delhi, New Delhi, India. Post Graduation in History completed in 1989.

· Lady Shri Ram College, New Delhi. Bachelor of Arts, 1987. Honors in History.

Others

· Invited to several national and international platforms to deliver talks and share her experience on governance reforms, GO-NGO platforms, inclusive development strategies etc. Significant are the Leadership Conference at Malyasia organized by Commonwealth Association, Conference on inclusive growth amongst IBSA countries at Brazil, International Women’s conference organized by Art of Living at Bali, besides her award winning presentations at Commonwealth Conference at Malta in 2010, and Sydney, Australia in 2006.

· Serves as patron of several Non govt organizations of repute such as the Delhi Chess Association, The All India Federation of Deaf and Dumb

· Rashmi comes from an illustrious family of freedom fighters, and social crusaders. She is the granddaughter of Sh Kamta Prasad Singh ‘ KAM’, freedom fighter and members of first legislative assembly in Bihar after independence, and daughter of famous literary personality and Hindi crusader, Sh Shankar Dayal Singh, who served as a distinguished member of parliament from Bihar both in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha.