NCW issues advisory to ensure safety of women in educational institutions
Recently, the National Commission for Women (NCW) has issued an advisory to ensure the safety of women in educational institutions.
- Under the advisory, the Chief Secretaries of all States and Union Territories have been asked to issue the following instructions to all coaching institutes/educational institutions:
- Ensure strict implementation of the ‘Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Prevention) Act, 2013’. This act is also called the Prevention of Sexual Harassment (PoSH) Act.
- Organize awareness programs for better reporting of cases.
- Check the background of the persons responsible for running the coaching centre.
- The PoSH law is designed to make workplaces safer for women. The law includes provisions relating to prevention, prohibition and redressal of acts of sexual harassment of women at the workplace.
- This law is based on the Vishakha guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court in the year 1997.
Features of PoSH Act:
- It defines ‘sexual harassment at workplace’. Also, mechanism has been provided for redressal of grievances.
- A broad definition of victim woman has been fixed. Its scope covers all aggrieved women, irrespective of their age or employment status and whether they are employed in organized or unorganized sector, public or private sector. Apart from this, clients, customers and domestic servants have also been included.
- Constitution of an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) is mandatory in every private or public organization employing 10 or more employees.
- A local committee will be constituted by the District Magistrate to register complaints against organizations with less than 10 employees or the employer himself.
National Commission for Women (NCW)
- About five decades ago, the Committee on the Status of Women in India (CSWI) recommended the establishment of a ‘National Commission for Women’ to facilitate redressal of grievances and carry out monitoring functions to accelerate the socio-economic development of women. .
- All other committees and commissions, including the National Perspective Plan for Women (1988–2000), recommended the formation of an apex body for women.
- The National Commission for Women was established as a statutory body in January 1992 under the National Commission for Women Act, 1990.
- The commission was constituted on 31 January 1992 under the chairmanship of ‘Jayanti Patnaik’.
- The commission consists of a chairman, a member secretary and five other members. The chairman of NCW is nominated by the central government.
Source – The Hindu
