The Nirbhaya Fund was set up in the aftermath of the gruesome gang-rape and murder of a paramedical student in Delhi in 2012, and aims at improving safety for women. Photo: Getty Images
New Delhi: The Centre on Thursday approved projects worth over Rs2,900 crore under the Nirbhaya fund for eight major cities of the country in a bid to make them safer for women.
Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Lucknow have been sanctioned a total of Rs2,919.55 crore after a meeting today of the Empowered Committee, which is headed by the secretary of Women and Child Development (WCD), a official statement said.
The Nirbhaya Fund was set up in the aftermath of the gruesome gang-rape and murder of a paramedical student in Delhi in 2012, and aims at improving safety for women.
Delhi has been sanctioned Rs663.67 crore for using latest technologies, such as video monitoring, facial recognition analytics and tracking of people. The national capital will also get more police patrol vans equipped with GPS and the capability of sharing video feed.
Mumbai has been granted Rs252 crore for projects, which include mapping of criminal hotspots, video surveillance as well as for strengthening the “Police Didi” programme which focuses on women police personnel interacting with women living in slums.
Kolkata will get Rs181.32 crore for various schemes, including for strengthening nine women police stations.
Bengaluru has been sanctioned projects worth Rs667 crore, which include setting up women police outposts and creation of safety islands at vulnerable places. According to a senior official of the ministry of women and child development, “These proposals have been sanctioned for a period of three years on a cost sharing basis of 60:40 ratio with states.”
Between 2013 and 2017, the corpus of Nirbhaya Fund has grown to Rs3,100 crore. Another Rs500 crore has been set aside for it for the next fiscal. These programmes have been sanctioned after various rounds of meeting between the officials of the ministry well as municipal corporations and police commissioners of these cities.
The Empowered Committee also okayed user trial of panic button feature on mobile phones in Uttar Pradesh to be initiated later this month. It has also sanctioned setting up of a model forensic science laboratory in Chandigarh.
