Fin Min okays road ministry’s plan for safety of women under Nirbhaya Fund

November 19, 2013

Mihir Mishra : New Delhi,

The finance ministry has approved plans by the road transport and home ministries and the department of information technology to implement safety improvement measures for women under the Nirbhaya Fund.

“The plans by ministry of road transport and highways and home affairs and department of information technology have been selected by the finance ministry,” said a senior road transport ministry official. The approvals came in a meeting chaired by the finance minister this month.

This fund, to be spent on providing security to the women across the country, was announced by finance minister P Chidambaram in Budget 2013-14.

The official further said that the road transport ministry’s approved plan, includes installing cameras and global positioning system (GPS) in buses and other modes of public transport.

“The recordings by cameras and GPS will be monitored real time. We also plan to closely work with the police to ensure their intervention in case of detection of any untoward incident. The plan is to implement these in cities with population over 1 million,” he added.

The intercity buses plying in Delhi have GPS system installed and any change in route is detected by the control centre, where it is monitored.

“We also have to decide on the number of control centres that is going to be opened. Whether we open it in all cities or key cities is a decision that needs to be taken,” he added.

The plan by the department of information technology is to come up with a watch, pen or mobile with a panic button to send out distress signals. The home ministry’s plan is to develop a system to ensure tracking accidents as early as possible.

The Nirbhaya Fund was name after Nirbhaya, a pseudonym given to the victim of the gang rape that took place in Delhi on December 16, 2012.

Source-http://www.indianexpress.com