It is really shocking that despite a government which is ruling the country for the last over 11 years trumpeting about women safety and empowerment with its ministers never missing a chance to self-boast over the issue, the data available on ground paints a grim picture telling that around 40 percent of women in India’s cities feel “not so safe” or “unsafe”. This has come to fore in the National Annual Report and Index on Women’s Safety (NARI 2025), launched by Vijaya Kishore Rahatkar, Chairperson of the National Commission for Women (NCW).
The dismal scenario has emerged in a report which surveyed 12,770 women across 31 cities, providing a data-driven assessment of women’s safety. There is a bad content in the aforesaid report with regard to people especially women living in Jammu and Kashmir because Srinagar has been placed in the group of cities marked as the ‘least safe’ for the fair sex community.
It is pertinent to mention that the aforesaid report has identified Kohima, Visakhapatnam, Bhubaneswar, Aizawl, Gangtok, Itanagar, and Mumbai as the safest cities for women, while Ranchi, Kolkata, Delhi, Faridabad, Patna, and Jaipur besides Srinagar have been ranked as the least safe puncturing the balloon of the union government about Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao. With so many cities having a dwindling record of women safety, one can gauge well about the efficacy of those running the affairs of the country especially with regard to such sensitive issues.
It has been unravelled that seven per cent of women reported harassment in 2024, which is significantly higher compared to what is reported in NCRB-2022 crime statistics, calling for immediate focus over the issue or things might go out of hand in the coming times. As per the report, safety concerns rise at night due to poor lighting and limited security, with 33 per cent of the women reporting incidents and 16 per cent seeing action taken.
Additionally, 53 per cent of the women were unaware of workplace Prevention of Sexual Harassment (POSH) policies, which is again disturbing as governments both at the centre and in the states have miserably failed to impart awareness about this vital issue. It is likely that such reports will help in spreading awareness and understanding about the safety concerns of women in our cities. As far as J&K is concerned, with cops under the control of the Home Ministry, it is expected that the cities and towns should be safer for one and all especially the women but the women safety index has pointed out things differently making it necessary for the helmsman to do the needful and ensure that whether it is day or night, home or office, or marketplace, the women should feel safe in every nook and corner of the Union Territory.
