AAP govt has failed to protect women, says Sharmistha Mukherjee

New Delhi: Lashing out at the Delhi government and its bureaucrats for downplaying eve teasing and harassment cases in DTC buses, Delhi Pradesh Mahila Congress Committee president Sharmistha Mukherjee said on Saturday that the Delhi and Central government have failed to provide safety and security to women in the national capital.

It was reported recently that a college student faced extreme harassment on DTC route no. 544, due to which she had to jump off the bus.

Ms Mukherjee accused the AAP government of “failure” to ensure security for women in its three-year rule in Delhi.

“The sexual harassment of a female student in a bus shows that the Delhi government’s promise of ensuring women’s safety by deploying marshals and equipping buses with closed-circuit televisions has fallen flat,” Ms Mukherjee said.

“Delhi police is under the BJP-led Central government and it has also failed to control such cases in the national capital. Delhi has become the crime capital,” she added.

She asked the Delhi government and chief minister Arvind Kejriwal why the decision to deploy marshals in buses has not been implemented yet.

“AAP once played a key role in the Nirbhaya movement and had been in power since 2015. Yet, cases of molestation and sexual harassment are on the rise. Even Delhi transport corporation (DTC) buses and cluster buses are not secure in the national capital, which is a matter of great shame,” said Ms Mukherjee.

“What happened to the promise of women’s security force? What has the Delhi government done to improve the last-mile connectivity?” she asked, demanding that the culprit in the case be arrested at the earliest.

She alleged that both BJP and Congress are involved in pseudo boxing matches and people of Delhi are at the receiving end due to their failure to run the government.