In a bid to address security concerns of women, the Indian government ultimately got successful in convincing the mobile phone manufacturers to install a Panic button in every handset. Indian Union Cabinet Minister for Women & Child Development, Maneka Gandhi has managed to get mobile phone firms on board for providing a panic button in handsets by March in the upcoming year that will help women to send alerts to police in case of emergency. Maneka Gandhi said that the final drafts on mandatory regulations will be soon issued by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) in this regard.
The plan that has been finalized with the consent of mobile manufacturers will help address the issues of women’s security with the installation of panic button for both latest as well as existing mobile phones. With this enhanced feature over mobile phones, women will be able to send alerts to police in emergency situations. Maneka Gandhi’s idea of bringing this new mandatory panic button for all handsets is to ensure security for women. The SOS button will become compulsory for new and old phones from March 2016.
“It took us one year to finalize this initiative. We held several meetings with mobile companies and they have finally agreed to provide panic buttons in mobile phones,” she said. “If a woman feels she is in trouble, the only thing she has to do is press that button and it will immediately send a message to the police,” she said.
New “Panic Button” for Ensuring Women Safety
With the new panic button on the mobile phones, for instance, if women anticipate any problem, they can just press the dedicated SOS key so that the phone will automatically send an alert to the nearest police station. Through this alert, police will get an alert which helps her get rescued.
Maneka Gandhi said that the new handsets will come with inbuilt buttons so that customers will be able to upgrade their phones at dedicated mobile centers. “We have asked the companies to built at least 10,000 centers across the country to facilitate mobile phone users in upgrading their phones and adding the button,” she said.
Besides this, other measures being taken by the Union Ministry of Women and Child development ministry include the launching of a national women helpline number that will be accepted throughout the country to render assistance to women in distress. The helpline services will be integrated with one-stop centers that provide police, legal, medical and counseling assistance to women.
The government has devised a scheme of special police volunteers in every village to involve young educated girls in community policing. They will be well-trained to work as a bridge between police and community women. They will help in ensuring the protection of women against violence of all sorts.