Patna: Various women organisations would jointly observe black day on July 20 to protest against increase in rape incidents in the state.
Members of All India Progressive Women's Association (AIPWA), Bihar Mahila Samaj, Bihar Women's Network and other women's association, who would take part in the protest on Thursday asked why chief minister Nitish Kumar and deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi were mum over institutional rape incidents reported from Muzaffarpur-based short stay home.
The home for girls, run by non-government organisation Seva Sankalp Vikas Sansthan, recently hogged the limelight following allegations of sexual exploitation of some girl inmates. The racket came to the fore after Mumbai-based Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) conducted a social audit of 110 short stay homes in Bihar early this year.
Most of the girls accused the office-bearers of the non-government organisation, which used to look after the inmates, of sexual assault. Eleven people are lodged in jail in connection with the incident, including suspended child protection officer Ravi Roushan.
AIPWA members sought to know from the state government why the government was mum over the issue even after getting a report on this from TISS in February.
"Does this not point out that some government officials might be involved in the entire thing? The permission of running 12 NGOs cannot be given to the NGO owner Brajesh Thakur without the involvement of senior state government officials. After filing the FIR in this connection on May 28, the girl inmates of the NGO were sent to different districts. Why was such a decision taken in haste? Why the district magistrate-headed vigilance committee couldn't find out malpractice before when all this was going on for years?" asked the national president of AIPWA Meena Tiwary.
Bihar Mahila Samaj working president Nivedita Jha asked about the whereabouts of the three inmates.
"So far we got details of 44 girl inmates of the short stay home but a total of 47 were living in the home. Where are the rest? We demand that the TISS report should be made public. We also demand that the CID should be detached from this case and all the girls of the stay home should be kept together at a place according to their wish and they should be provided counselling by trained counsellors," said Jha.