Kathmandu, June 16

The Ministry of Women, Children and Senior Citizens has drawn attention of the Ministry of Home Affairs to rising cases of gender based violence, domestic violence, rape, murder and suicide across the country in the past few months.

In its letter sent to MoHA yesterday, MoWCSC stated the cases of GBV, domestic violence, rape and suicide continued unabated amidst abnormal situation resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent nationwide lockdown. “It is urgent to address all these issues in an effective manner and bring to the perpetrators book, while ensuring immediate rescue, rehabilitation and legal remedies for the victims,” read the letter.

The MoWCSC also said victims were facing difficulty to lodge complaints with the concerned agencies due to restriction on their mobility. In some cases, the concerned agencies were found reluctant to register complaints under various pretexts.

“Denial to register the complaints have led to suicide of some of the victims,” it warned.

“Therefore, we would like to request you to issue directives to the concerned agencies to initiate immediate action against perpetrators of all forms violence meted out to women and children.” According to statistics maintained by Women’s Rehabilitation Centre, an NGO, as many as 624 women and girls from 55 districts experienced different forms of violence since March 24. Of them, 379 women suffered from domestic violence, both physical and mental.

Data indicated that women were abused verbally, tortured physically and mentally in the name of dowry, giving birth to a girl child or being childless even after being married for years. In 67 cases, women were deprived of most essential basic needs and services.

The organisation said only 329 cases were reported to the police. In the case of domestic violence, the perpetrators were often set free after reconciliation with the victims. According to statistics released by Nepal Police, as many as 875 persons committed suicide from March 24 to May 16. It is an increase by around seven per cent compared to the corresponding period, last year.

A version of this article appears in e-paper on June 17, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.