COIMBATORE: Kailash Satyarthi's 'Children's Foundation' and 'NEEDS' an NGO organised a 'Rape Free India pledge' campaign here in which leaders of both national and regional parties took part and signed a pledge to eradicate this evil by 2022.
Addressing media on Thursday, State Convener of Rape Free India P. Rajagopal stated that crimes against children in the state have shown a growing trend with an increase of 175% in five years from 2012 to 16. This could be due to the increase in awareness and improvement in reporting cases.
In 2016, as many as 2,856 cases of crimes against children were reported under Indian Penal Code and Protection of Children against Sexual Offences (POCSO). Of all the registered crimes against children across the country in 2016, about 3% were from TN. The state stands at 15th in terms of percentage share of the total incidences of crimes against children registered in 2016 and thus the movement and the campaign has gained momentum.
The campaign Rape Free India initiated on April 6 in Patna has conducted ten public dialogues so far in Patna, Raipur, Vijayawada, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar, Bangaluru, Ahmadabad, Tiruchy, Jhansi and Pune.
Dr G. Umashankar a child rights activist stated that as part of the ongoing month-old campaign 'Rape Free India', from Tamil Nadu, namely Dhanush M Kumar from DMK, E.V.K.S. Elangovan from Indian National Congress, S. Venkatesan from CPI(M) in Tamil Nadu have signed a pledge to make India 'rape free' by 2022. Till date, 19 candidates from state have pledged for the safety of women and children.
