Assembly committee concerned over rising crimes against women in state

SHILLONG, Oct 2: The Assembly Committee for Empowerment of Women is concerned over the growing cases of crime against women in Meghalaya.
Observing that statistically the state was performing well since the IMR and MMR data are stable, Chairperson of the committee and East Shillong Legislator, Ampareen Lyngdoh lamented the sporadic cases of crime against women. She referred to the recent case in Ri-Bhoi district where a woman was brutally killed by her estranged husband.
Requesting the Ri-Bhoi authorities to immediately take punitive action, she said, “I can understand that police is not in total control of the crimes that occur around them. So maybe we are barking at the wrong tree; maybe we have to tell the men, women and families across the state to cooperate with the police and ensure homes do not become dangerous for women and they are not humiliated, attacked and murdered.”
“Something is not going right and I think after the elections I would like to see communities and societies around us contributing to the safety of women,” she said.
Stressing on the need to have an action plan and make it operational at the earliest, Lyngdoh said, “I can’t understand why we would wait only for the police or legal authorities to get justice delivered.”
She suggested that political parties should highlight these as important agendas in their manifestos.
“We should take it up politically and as a society so that we see a marked decrease in these kinds of crimes against women which continues to happen right under the nose of the authorities and stakeholders,” she added.