MADHYA PRADESH: Khattal (cot) since long has formed a seminal part of discussions and deliberations in family and public life in Bhil and Bhilala tribes-dominated Jhabua and Alirajpur districts. The same cots have now turned out to be the fulcrum of a multi-pronged strategy by police to curb rising crime against women in Bhilala-tribe dominated Alirajpur district, which is largely a matriarchal society.
The Khattal Sabha/Chaupals (meeting and counselling on cots) constitute an integral part of a dedicated community policing model, which combined with a crackdown against perpetrators of crime against women and regularly monitored crime prosecution/conviction system has helped the police bring down cases of crime against women by around 27%.
The amalgam of community policing and crackdown against wrongdoers followed by strict and regularly monitored crime prosecution has not only brought the graph of crime against women by around 27% this year (period up to October 31) when compared to the corresponding period of the previous year, but also dramatically improved the rate of conviction in such crimes by nine times, from the measly 5% to around 45% now.
A break-up of these decline in total crime against women in the 10 months period this year, compared to the same period last year, shows that maximum 67% drop was registered in case of attempted killings of women, followed by 50% decline in cases of abduction (particularly cases of minors eloping with boys and men to adjoining Gujarat), around 30-32% decrease in cases of rape and molestation and almost 30% dip in dowry harassment cases. The cases registered under the POCSO Act 2012 have particularly declined by over 34%.
But achieving this significant decrease in crimes against women cases was quite tough. “Alirajpur district, which is among the few districts of MP having a positive sex ratio (1011 females to 1000 males) is largely a matriarchal society, but still the cases of crime against women were quite high. Women were murdered or assaulted brutally by their better halves even on the smallest issues, like excessive salt in food. Another factor adding to this grim scenario was minor girls being lured by young boys to adjoining Gujarat, ultimately leading to increase in cases of kidnapping of minor girls,” recounts sub-divisional officer police (SDOP-Alirajpur) Shraddha Sonkar.
According to the district’s police superintendent Manoj Kumar Singh, who assumed the charge in September 2021, "Reducing crime against women was our main challenge and we took up the gauntlet.
I took a cue from CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s successful model of holding Khattal Chaupals and Sabha with tribals in the same region in 2020 and made it the prime part of our community policing model. Khattal Chaupals and Sabhas to establish constructive dialogue with villagers, including elder males, youngsters, besides the fairer sex, were organised in almost all villages up to their Faliya (mohallas in village) level. Initially, we saw an inherent fear among villagers about the police, despite us talking to them in their most acceptable Khattal Chaupal language. Slowly the resistance started making way to constructive dialogue followed by resolve in individual villages to stop crime against women,”
Singh maintained.
Community policing initiatives were subsequently taken to individual girl schools and colleges, where teenage girls were particularly sensitized by our female cops about the harmful consequences of elopement and turning pregnant at a tender age. The school and college girls were also motivated and trained in various self-defence skills up to individual Anganwadi level. Special counselling of teenage and vulnerable girls and women too have become a regular feature of policing in the district.
The community policing was taken to the next level, during the Navratri celebrations under the state government’s Chetna Abhiyan, where the cops reached out to 90-odd Garba pandals, besides other public places frequented by women, and educated them about how to protect selves from crime, particularly human trafficking.
The police’s crackdown against perpetrators of crime against women was further highlighted by demolition action against the house and other properties of accused, in at least four cases of rape of minors.