CB BureauThe police station may be the last
place where people in troubled marriages would go for counselling, but that is
precisely what is happening at the Patan DSP office, where Gujarat’s first
social counselling centre has been set up in a unique public-private
partnership of the police with women’s rights agency Ahmedabad Women’s Action
Group (AWAG).
Counsellor Chetna Patel said she recently
accompanied a woman who was attacked by her husband with a blade. ‘The woman
was shaken up and we helped her file a complaint against her husband under
section 498 (A). We also counselled her to help her overcome the emotional
trauma,’ said Patel.
As per Ila Pathak, founder-director of AWAG, the
partnership happened after a long-time observation that most times the police
stations concerned would not admit the complaint of a woman alleging domestic
abuse, asking her to return home or saying that this might break her home.
‘We believed that many suicides by
women took place only after they failed to get justice or make their voice
heard,’ said Pathak.
DSP of Patan Anupamsinh Gehlot said the union had
so far been a fruitful one. ‘This approach works because about 80 per cent of
domestic abuse-related cases that come to us can be solved by social
counselling. The counsellors here give a patient hearing to the women in
distress and also help police tackle them better and more sensitively,’ Gehlot told The Times of
India.
Pathak said there were plans to start the project
in three districts. If successful, it will then be replicated in other
districts as well.