Starting In March, 2018, the Women Safety Wing was established within which a SHE Module was created to monitor the work done by all the SHE Teams in Telangana State to take care of issues related to women and children. SHE module’s aim is to deal with the offences relating to Women and Children, especially Eve-Teasing, Stalking, Harassment against Women / Children in public places, Work places, Educational institutions, residential areas etc., or through cyberspace. Women Safety Wing as chief co-ordinating agency has brought 331 She Teams of 31 police units under single umbrella by establishing uniform process to work at fied level with citizens. Women Safety Wing, now trains, capacity builds, as well as hand holds all the SHR Teams to make them brand ambassadors for safety of women in their respective units. Complaints are compiled from numerous gateways and incorporated into application, latest addition being QR as mechanism to complain.
During the year 2021 (as on 30.09.2021) a total number of 4144 complaints have been received through the above modes, 67% of the complaints received from In-direct mode and 33% through direct walk into SHE Team offices. In the last 7 years, various technologies have been adopted by SHE Module, Women Safety Wing.
A software application was especially designed for the She Teams Officers working in Districts / Commissionerates to update and store the unit wise SHE Team data. In the year 2019 only 2 units were using SHE Team Software, now it is extended to all 30 Units in Telangana State. In the year 2021 (as on 30.09.2021) 4144 complaints were received. Later, On 21.03.2021, Women Safety Wing launched a QR Code Mechanism for complaints in order to provide easy access to Victims to scan the barcode to file complaints & send feedback with the district SHE Team from anywhere in Telangana State. The barcodes were available in Telugu/English/Urdu languages and have been placed in every metro trains & metro stations, TSRTC bus depots and bus stands, inside the buses, major railway stations in Cyberabad and Hyderabad Commissionerate metro. Complaints directly land into SHE Team software and the concerned district SHE Team incharge will contact the victim for further details and take action based on the complaint and evidence and send feedback to the victim. Total 315 complaints were received.
In order to make the reporting process easier for the people, the WSW has launched a non emergency WhatsApp number (9441669988) for the state SHE Team. Victims are requested to report harassment being faced by them from anywhere in the state to the Women Safety Wing WhatsApp number that will be diverted to the respective Unit SHE Team. This process is closely monitored and followed up by WSW. During the year 2020 total 537 complaints were received from across the Telangana State and during the year 2021 (as on 30.09.2021) total 435 complaints have been received among them 193 are mobile and social media harassment, 101 – DVC complaints.
On 14.10.2020 Women Safety Wing with the help of Psychological Experts started the process of Online Counselling to the respondents in SHE Team. As of now 6 online counsellings were held and a total 1273 respondents were brought for the counselling sessions 1119-Major respondents and 154- Minor respondents have been counselled online so far.
Echoing the vision, ‘Girl Safety Clubs’ were launched in the month of February 2020 where students were shortlisted from 5 selective colleges as volunteers to report any crime happening against girl students in their respective colleges. Also, an online Training session was conducted at 13 colleges for around 325 students who were trained by the Women Safety Wing, this concept is now being extended to all colleges in Telangana State.
With the surge in cyber attacks on women and children across Telangana during the devastating pandemic, WSW has initiated a two directional approach. On one hand, the cases being reported/ that were coming to the notice of She Teams officers were being resolved on priority and on the other hand, a robust initiative has been launched as a result of timely action that led to an initiative called ‘CybHER – Making Cyberspace Safe for Women and Children’.
As part of the initiative, ‘CybHER I’, a month-long awareness programme was launched covering a multitude of themes pertaining to cyber safety, providing an interactive and informative platform for a healthy discussion on digital wellness and cyber safety. In the
course of one month, it gained 12,000 participants and reached out to 50 lakh people, which is now demonstrated as one of the role model concepts for e-policing in the country. In addition to the month-long campaign, an awareness session was hosted on the topic of ‘Cyber Safety and Security’. The session engaged 3.75 lakh adolescent children from various schools of urban and rural parts of Telangana. All the children were glued to the screens during a thought-provoking session on Cyber Safety which were delivered in a child-friendly manner. During these sessions, the students asked multiple questions on cyber safety which prompted the need for a long-term project called Cyber Congress.
CybHER III termed as Cyber Congress brought a new perspective in e-community policing especially among the rural students of the state. It welcomed a multi stakeholder approach with having the Educational department of Telangana State, Youngistaan Foundation (NGO) and a Cyber Safety and Security expert (Knowledge partner) as key stakeholders. The initiative works on a ‘Train the Trainer’ concept where 2 students selected from each ZPHS school are trained with Cyber Safety and are equipped to create awareness of the same to their peers, communities and immediate audience. As part of this initiative, WSW is training 3,300 students as Cyber Ambassadors and 1650 teachers across 1650 ZPHS Schools with 50 Schools from each district in the 33 districts of Telangana. The unit SHE Team officers coordinate and assist the stakeholders in organizing the sessions uninterruptedly and have made themselves easily accessible to all the students to report any case. Trainers facilitate in the local language and train to handle the online threats to children and also to promote the positive use of internet and mobile phones. Appointed Experts provide regular updates and features online, which in turn is shared with other students and community by the local
cyber ambassadors. The greater goal of this initiative is to have the Cyber Ambassadors as torch bearers of Cyber Safety in their communities, create more cyber ambassadors and work alongside the She Teams Officers in the lines of strengthening people friendly policing.
The impact survey conducted in March 2016 and November 2020 by Bhoomika Women’s collective and CESS (Centre for Economic and Social Studies) respectively highlights that 89% of people in Hyderabad and surrounding areas are aware of SHE Teams and their work. While 96% of victims who approached SHE Teams rated their services as ‘good’ and ‘satisfactory’ and 92% of them said that they did not face any problem right from approaching SHE Teams to getting their problem resolved.
